Silent Learning
by Dannrose
Summary: Lance wanted out of his situation, but he never planned on that way out involving robot lions, aliens and an intergalactic war. A far cry from his life on the streets, he has to quickly learn things others consider basic knowledge and being mute does not help things. AU featuring a mute Lance.
1. Chapter 1

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello everyone and welcome to my first foray into this fandom. This is an AU featuring a mute/street-kid Lance, and it'll probably look more at the 'un-seen' stories and devolve into a one-shot series full of space-family fluff. I hope you all enjoy this opening/AU setting chapter.**_

 _ **I do not own any aspect of Voltron: Legendary Defender.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 1**

Piloting a giant lion through space, with four people he didn't know, and ending up at an alien castle was not what Lance had in mind when he wished for a way out of his situation.

He was born on the streets, lived on the streets and was likely to die on the streets, unnoticed by the best of the world and used by the worst. That was his mother's life and his only inheritance from her, he had no idea who his father was and frankly, he didn't want to know. With no education, no money and no chance of either, his options were nearly non-existent, and he'd burned by 'The System' before, so he had no intention of trusting it again. Finally, there was one other, glaring disadvantage he had.

He was mute.

The one time he'd not been on the streets, doctors had confirmed that his lack of voice was definitely due to physical factors, Lance himself hadn't understood all the complicated terms involved, but he knew that there was no easy fix (not that he'd stuck around long enough to find out for sure).

Regardless, being mute did not make things easy, its hard to make deals with fellow gutter members when you couldn't talk, and hand signals didn't get you much further.

Theft was his main method of survival, along with scrounging off the leftovers of everyone else. He mostly left actual money alone (he had no clue how to use the stuff and most people didn't carry change around with them anyway), but he'd happily swipe food when he got the chance. Outdoor café tables were great places to snatch a morsel, as well as worksites where you could raid unattended workmen lunches, and, if he was feeling particularly daring, maybe pickpocket some passer-by's snack bar. He avoided charity centres and such like the plague, using them had brought him to 'The System', so they were far too risky.

Moving around the dingiest parts of the city, and never visiting the same spots repeatedly, he stayed unnoticed by the Police (more lackeys of 'The System') and scraped out a life alone. Occasionally, he took a bit of a wander out to the 'Garrison', just beyond the city and helped himself to a little something from their kitchens. He'd found a route that would get him in unnoticed and, if he got lucky, he might find one or two of those flat, electronic things that they had there. He could then trade 'Old Sam' those for enough food to keep him going for a week, a rare luxury.

It was one of those trips that led him to flying a lion.

* * *

Firstly, something crashed into the desert, attracting his attention, then he'd nearly been run over by some trucks heading for the crash site, then one of the trucks stopped and before he could run, the guys inside had dived out and whisked him inside, saying something about 'being a witness' and 'helping with inquiries'. What followed was a blur of questions, and confusion then, three kids burst in and grabbed an adult who seemed to be a captive. Lance opted for going with them because they had a vehicle that'd get him away from the official looking guys quicker and planned to slip away from them later.

He quickly regretted that decision when they'd pulled him further into the desert and he had no idea which way he'd have to go to reach the city. While he could live on the streets fine, he'd never not been in the city and had no hope of surviving out here.

As such, he was stuck with his new friends for the foreseeable future.

After crashing for the rest of the night, they used a strange machine, the one called 'Hunk' built after finding a frown-line-thing, and they wound up at a cave before a massive blue lion surrounded by blue light.

This was when things got really weird.

He couldn't say what it was, but something pulled Lance towards the lion, towards the light that vanished at his touch. The vision of five of these lions becoming a massive man filled his mind and something stirred in his heart.

Before he knew it, he was inside the beast and sat in its chair, and this seemed to be all it needed.

It threw itself out of the mountain, bounding along the ground, before flinging itself into the air. The other four all screamed and shouted from behind his seat, but Lance was focused on the feelings in his head.

It wasn't like a voice as such, just…thoughts…ideas that he was sure came from the lion, telling him what to do, where to go, so he went with it.

"What are you doing!?"

The panicked voice of one of his passengers pulled his focus, and he snapped his head around to look into the face of the kid who'd been the getaway driver the night before. Obviously, the lion wasn't 'talking' to them, so they had no idea what was going on, and he definitely couldn't tell them.

Great, just great.

Then came the massive ship, a brief fight followed by a retreat, then the appearance of a massive portal thing which the lion wanted to go through.

Lance looked back at the others, eyes fixed on the only adult present, wondering how to tell them that the lion wanted to go into the portal. Before he could begin to even try signalling this information, the man frowned.

"I guess the lion wants to take us through that."

Lance nodded furiously, and the smallest of them stared at the portal nervously, "Where does it go?"

Lance shrugged and continued to stare at the one adult as getaway driver spoke, "Shiro, what do we do?"

The man (called Shiro apparently) answered decisively, "Whatever is happening, the lion knows more than we do. I say we trust it, but we're a team now. We should decide together."

There was brief silence, then those present nodded. Matter settled, Lance, with the lion's guidance, powered them into the portal.

* * *

Stood before the huge, gleaming castle, Lance couldn't help but gape, even more so when the doors opened to the lion's mighty roar. However, before they could enter, Shiro stopped them.

"Wait a moment."

All eyes turned upon him and the man fixed his gaze on Lance, "Now, I already know Keith, I remember Hunk from the Garrison before my mission and Pidge has told me who he is, but I don't think any of us really know you, do you mind introducing yourself?"

Instantly, he was the centre of attention, and Lance hesitated.

He really hated trying to act out his name and issue, fortunately he didn't actually have to do it very often because of his circumstances.

He pointed at himself then followed it with a two-handed stabbing motion forward. Receiving only blank looks in response, he repeated the pantomime several times until getaway driver (he thinks that's Keith) growls in frustration, "Why don't you just answer the question!?"

Lance sighed, then tried another mime, pointing at himself, then vigorously shaking his head and finishing with a motion as if something was coming out of his mouth. The big one (Hunk?) exclaimed excitedly, "Oh, you wanna puke?"

He face-palmed.

Shiro stepped towards him, understanding on his face, "You're mute, aren't you?"

Lance flung his hands up in triumph and nodded wildly, sparking sounds of realisation from everyone else. The smallest (he's certain that's Pidge) tweaked his glasses, "Okay then, why not write your name in the dirt?"

He grimaced and shook his head.

Pidge blinked, "Why not?"

He sighed, then shook his head again and mimed writing, causing the boy to stare in shock.

"What! How can you not write!?"

Shiro answered, "I think I can guess as to why, but let's not get into the theories and explanations right now." He looked to Lance, "Try and show us your name again."

The boy obliged, the rest watching him carefully, throwing out guesses.

"Stab!"

"Knife! Sword!"

"Thrust, Push!"

He stopped and stared incredulously…seriously, none of their guesses were even names!

"Lance?"

Once again, Shiro worked things out first, and Lance pointed at him and nodded furiously. The man grinned, "Good, Lance it is. Now that's sorted, let's head inside."

* * *

The next few hours were crazy.

They found Princess Allura and Coran, two aliens from a long-destroyed planet, located the other four lions, retrieved said lions, received their armour and bayards (his turned into a gun), fought a massive Galra ship, formed Voltron and finally won the day…barely.

Hence why they were now all collapsed on seats in a lounge like area in the castle.

Pidge, Hunk and Keith lay there groaning, while Lance was silent, his eyes shut from exhaustion, happy to just ignore everything happening around him.

"Paladins."

Allura's voice cut through his blissful ignorance, demanding the attention of them all, and he reluctantly pulled himself up into a sitting position.

She nodded to them all, "Coran and I have assigned you all a room each, I suggest you rest while you can. We'll start your training first thing tomorrow, and it will be hard."

They all slumped at those words, except Shiro who smiled slightly, "Understood princess." He faced them, "Paladins, time to turn in for the night."

They all obeyed, though Hunk did so while muttering about how he wasn't going to wake up for a week, but as they filed out of the room after Coran, who was showing them the way, Allura stopped him, "Lance, a moment please."

He stared at her in confusion and she frowned, "I have noticed that you haven't said anything to the others since you've arrived, not even during the battle. You must communicate with your teammates or Voltron will never be able to save the universe."

Lance grimaced, in all the excitement and craziness of the day, they hadn't told Allura and Coran about his problem.

"Princess, I'm afraid that Lance can't speak to the rest of us."

Shiro had lingered as well and opted to speak up on his behalf.

Allura fixed him with a look of shock, "What do you mean?"

"I mean, he physically can't speak to us, he's mute."

Her eyes fell back on him, a hint of pity within them, "I didn't realise." She looked back to Shiro, "We must come up with a way around this, your success as a team depends on communication."

She smiled at Lance, "I'll speak to Coran, tomorrow we can take a look at you in the infirmary and maybe find a way to help you speak. For now, rest."

* * *

 _ **PS-And there's the beginning, it'll likely be more like a one-shot series after this instead of a fully fleshed out story. Please let me know what you thought and I'll hopefully update soon.**_


	2. Chapter 2

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello everyone, and welcome to the second chapter. I probably won't get future chapters out as quickly as this one, but I'm feeling inspired at the moment, so I went with it. Thank you everyone who's followed, favourited and reviewed this story, and I hope you all enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 2**

Lance eyed the equipment around him warily.

After Allura's impromptu response drill (which they apparently failed), Coran and Shiro had whisked him down to the infirmary, saying they wanted to find out why he was mute.

While his limited experience with medicine wasn't bad, Lance remembered how he'd been dragged into 'The System' the one time he'd been in a hospital. This put him on edge, even though he knew that there was no way the others could do that to him here.

Regardless, all Coran did was wave some sort of tool at him and study whatever sciency stuff appeared on its screen. The Altean frowned.

"Now that's not good, no wonder you can't speak if your old voice box is like that." He frantically typed something on the screen, and his frown deepened, "I'm not sure even the cryo-pods can sort this out." He typed some more, then rushed over to another screen which flashed up a load of unreadable symbols and pictures. The man stared intently for some time, then sighed, his shoulders dropping dramatically.

Shiro, who'd been watching quietly, addressed the Altean, "Coran, what is it?"

Coran turned slowly and shook his head gently, "I'm afraid that the problems with Lance's voice are beyond even Altean medicine to fix. As far as his body is concerned, there's nothing to fix, so the cryo-pods won't be able to do anything, they won't heal what they don't think needs healing."

Shiro stared, "What do you mean?"

The older man sighed, "There's no way we can cure Lance's muteness." He looked at the boy sadly, "I'm sorry Lance."

* * *

It had been a long, hard day.

Allura pushed them mercilessly, throwing drill after drill at them, harping on and on about how they had to be able to form Voltron and constantly telling them they needed a stronger 'bond' with each other.

Well he'd like to point out that not being able to talk made bonding really difficult.

Of course, lack of speech also made pointing it out really difficult, as well as any form of communication in general. The amount of times one of the others would ask a question or give a comment expecting him to answer, only to remember that he couldn't was ridiculous, and frankly, he was fed up of having to perform some stupid pantomime, just to make a simple request or response.

Living on the streets alone meant he wasn't used to being around people, communicating with them. He wasn't used to having to give answers, ask questions or just generally socialise.

This is probably why he hadn't been that bothered when Coran said there was nothing they could do to cure his muteness. He'd survived without his voice this long, in fact, he never remembered even having it, and while it had definitely been a disadvantage, it'd never been a massive problem for him.

Until today.

Throughout all their drills, his inability to speak had been a clear issue. He couldn't let them know what was happening quickly, and hand signals were useless when he needed his hands to fly his lion or hold his weapon. His non-existent writing ability meant he couldn't communicate that way and yes-no question were too limiting for actual combat situations, especially if the others weren't in a position to see him move his head.

All of it had really brought home just what was happening to him.

Two days ago, he'd been scraping out a living on the streets, his own survival taking priority over everything else. Now, he was living in an alien castle on another planet and piloting a giant, robot lion, despite never having been near even the simplest of planes. At the moment, Blue's guidance in his head was the only way he was managing, but that would only last so long.

He also now had teammates, actual, real teammates. Not people who'd come to a brief, mutually beneficial deal, but real people who he was going to be living alongside for who knows how long. People he had to be able to talk to.

He looked around his room.

That was yet something else he couldn't grasp, he had a room, with a bed, an actual bed. He's never slept in a bed in his life (all he'd had was whatever he could find in some dingy alley) and its softness unnerved him to point he slept on the floor the night before.

The door slid open, causing him to jump (he definitely wasn't used to them), and he glanced up to see Hunk standing awkwardly in the doorway.

"Um, Lance. We need you up on the bridge, me and Pidge have something for you."

Lance tilted his head in confusion, something for him?

He stood up from where he'd been sat on the floor and followed Hunk to the bridge. Things were silent for a while, until the other boy spoke nervously, "So, what a day huh?"

Lance nodded hesitantly, not sure if his companion was expecting some form of response. It seemed to be the right thing to do, because Hunk grinned a little more easily, "But it all worked out eventually, we actually managed to form Voltron. Who'd have thought that it needed a food fight to create the greatest weapon in the universe, but it was fun though?"

Lance frowned, he'd never really considered how fun it was. He wasn't used to having fun, survival had always taken priority in his life, but that food fight hadn't had anything to do with survival. In fact, it'd been entirely pointless at the time, but he'd joined in anyway, maybe because of the others or simply because he was fed up of Allura and Coran at the time and he'd taken the chance to vent his frustrations. Either way, he'd found himself feeling happy as he did so, and though he couldn't laugh, he felt like he was.

After a short pause, he gave a small smile and nodded, causing Hunk to grin, "Knew it, you looked like you were having a great time."

He blinked, Hunk had focused on him at some point during the food fight? He'd have thought the other boy would've been too focused on what was happening to notice his feelings at all.

* * *

They reached the bridge and Lance wasn't surprised to see everyone present, what did surprise him was how most of them were smiling at him and Pidge was practically bursting with excitement.

The smallest paladin began speaking the moment he entered, "Lance, you're going to love what me, Hunk and Coran came up with!"

Beside Pidge, Coran twirled his moustache with pride, "Indeed Number 3, its really a genius idea Number 5 came up with, though it was a joint effort to get it working this quickly."

Pidge began to explain rapidly, "You see, since we can't cure your muteness, I began trying to think of a way to help you communicate with us. Of course, it had to be quick since we really don't have much time in the middle of a battle, and it had to work even if we couldn't see you. This cuts out voice replication technology because the human voice is far too complicated to replicate in a machine and takes too long to relay a simple sentence, even with Altean tech, plus it's far too easy to mimic, making it a security risk. Then the headsets from our mind meld exercise gave me an idea, so me, Hunk and Coran fiddled about with one and TA DA!"

He thrust one of the mind headset things towards Lance, and the boy took it in confusion, holding it awkwardly in his hands. Pidge stared at him expectantly, "Put it on."

Slightly bewildered, the boy did as he was told and then held his hands in a 'now what?' gesture.

Hunk rubbed his hands together in anticipation, "Now, answer this question in your head only. What is your name?"

Lance raised an eyebrow, but complied, mentally answering the question.

"Yes, it worked!"

Hunk and Pidge high-fived while Coran twirled his moustache smugly and the others stared in surprise. Lance was baffled, and he tilted his head in confusion.

This only caused Hunk and Pidge to celebrate once again while the rest smiled, confusing him even more. Allura approached him and gave him a mirror.

"Here Lance, look into this and think of something you want to tell us. That'll explain what's going on."

Taking the mirror, Lance looked into it and did as asked, deciding on telling them how confused he was.

Immediately, a curved line running to a dot was seemingly beamed out of the headset in his reflection, telling him it was happening with the real thing. He nearly dropped the mirror in surprise and the symbol instantly switched to a straight vertical line, also running to a dot.

His eyes shot up to the others and Hunk beamed, "You see, we configured the headset to project symbols based on what you're trying to communicate. Since its designed to read your mind, we programmed it to only focus on thoughts you want to communicate to others and then do so via the symbols."

Coran took up the explanation, "Normally, the headset would work with the projectors in the training room, but we installed a small projector in this one and upgraded its internal power source to last longer."

Pidge continued, "We went with symbols because they'll likely be easier for others to understand, especially since Allura and Coran can't read English, so you should be able to communicate to some extent with anyone." He tweaked his glasses, "And now we know that it works, we can upgrade your helmet to have a similar function and get it to flash up what you're trying to tell us on our visor displays. It'll take some time, but I think we can get it linked in to work as well as our comms."

Hunk finished, "Meaning that you don't have to worry about communicating with us anymore!"

Shiro stepped forward and smiled at the three of them, "Good work guys, and impressive considering that you haven't been working on it that long."

Allura nodded, "Agreed, and I'm certain you'll only improve it over time."

Keith finally spoke up, "Well Lance, what do you think?"

Lance grinned, and although he couldn't see for himself, he was certain that the headset was projecting a thumbs-up.

* * *

 _ **PS- So, Lance can now communicate via a headset that projects symbols, allowing him to communicate without hand signals or mimes. Please let me know what you thought and I'll hopefully update soon.**_


	3. Chapter 3

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello all and welcome. This chapter is from Shiro's perspective as he starts helping Lance sort out certain things he has access to. Thank you for your continued support and I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 3**

Shiro wasn't sure how to approach this.

With them gaining traction as a team, getting gradually better at forming and using Voltron, plus finding a way to help Lance communicate, things were looking good. However, with the main issues being dealt with, it was calling attention to other problems, including team hygiene, or more specifically, one member's lack of it.

In short, Lance was filthy.

Shiro didn't hold it against the boy, between Lance's lack of basic literary skills, his clothing that was clearly worn till it fell to pieces, as well as some of his habits, it was obvious he was from a deprived background, most likely a street kid. As such, the fact he didn't wash was hardly surprising, he'd never had the facilities to do so and probably didn't even think about doing it. Now though, he had access to such things, and someone was going to have to mention something to the boy soon.

Shiro wanted to make sure it wasn't Allura.

While he and the others had worked out Lance's background, the princess and Coran likely hadn't. They'd come from Altea, a planet that sounded like it was prosperous for all its citizens, they probably wouldn't consider the possibility that Lance simply hadn't had the things they considered 'basic' and he'd already seen her turn her nose away in subtle disgust whenever the teen was within sniffing distance. No doubt she wouldn't be very gentle in informing Lance of his need to wash.

Hence why he was stood outside the boy's door, wondering how best to approach the issue.

He knocked, "Lance, its Shiro, can I come in?"

After a moment, the door chimed and opened.

Pidge and Hunk had altered Lance's door, rigging it up to a simple control panel beside the boy's bed. Basically, if someone knocked, he could either push a green, yellow or red button. The green button sounded a chime and opened the door while the red one sounded a buzzer and kept it shut, the yellow one sounded two chimes and was the 'hold on a moment' button.

His request granted, Shiro entered to find Lance sat on the floor, sliding on his headset.

Pidge had dubbed the device the Emoji Communication Device (ECD for short) and it had proven incredibly successful, already it had been upgraded several times as they programmed new symbols into it, including some Altean ones to help with speaking to Allura and Coran. They just had to make sure it was charged regularly.

ECD in place, it quickly projected a question mark.

Shiro hesitated before speaking, "Lance, have you been shown the shower attached to your room?"

The boy nodded, then looked thoughtful as the ECD projected a button which then got a red X stamped across it.

"I see."

It appeared that Lance did know about it but hadn't been shown how to use it. Lance shrugged carelessly and Shiro didn't need symbols to understand that it didn't bother the teen much.

"Lance, that's not the point. I understand that you've never had the facilities for it but washing regularly is something you need to do."

A question mark.

"Because its far better for your health, and everyone else's, and since you have everything you need to do it, you should wash every day."

Lance stared for a moment or two, then turned away looking embarrassed.

Shiro, certain as to why, smiled, "Its fine that you don't know how, its not your fault." He gestured to the bathroom door, "Firstly, I'll show you how the shower works."

With a nod of assent, Lance followed him into the bathroom and watched intently as Shiro began to explain.

"Okay, to begin with, you have three buttons. The one at the top simply turns the shower on. These showers control their temperature automatically, Pidge says you can programme them to the temperature you want, but the basic one is fine. The middle button puts the water on the basic temperature setting, while the bottom one makes the water cold, you're probably not going to use that one much." He looked at the boy, "Understand all that?"

Lance nodded and Shiro smiled, despite the teen's lack of knowledge, he picked things up fast if you explained it to him. The man reached into a small bag he'd brought with him, and fished out two bottles and handed them over, "Coran supplied these for us, they're to help you get clean. Basically, you soak yourself in the shower, then you rub the stuff in the blue bottle all over your body making it go soapy, then wash it off in the shower. The stuff in the red bottle is the same idea, except for your hair instead of your body." He passed the boy a brush, "You can use this to scrub yourself, understand?"

The teen eyed the two bottles then held the blue one up accompanied by a question mark.

"That's to go on your body."

Lance held up the red.

"That gets rubbed into your hair."

The boy smiled and nodded, then gestured to his clothes with a frown.

"Yes, you'll have to take your clothes off when you wash, that's the point."

A look of alarm crossed his face, and Shiro quickly put him at ease.

"Don't worry, I'm not going to be in here while you shower." He pointed to the door, "If you press the button beside the door, you can lock this room to stop anyone coming in. Just press it again to unlock it."

Lance gave a sigh of relief and Shiro chuckled as he headed for the door, "I'll just be outside, bang on the door if you need anything."

* * *

A good half hour or so later, Lance emerged from the shower, completely clean and dry and looking far better than he had.

He'd put back on his ragged clothes, and Shiro decided that that is what they had to sort next. Yes, they had the Paladin armour, but they couldn't expect Lance to wear that all the time and his own clothes were not fit for use.

Fortunately, they already had some replacements.

He held up the other items that had been in his bag, "Here Lance, I'm not sure how they did it, but Coran and Keith made these for you."

The items in question were a grey shirt, jeans and a brown-grey jacket, all based off of what Lance was already wearing, except clean and not falling to pieces. While it didn't seem much of a gesture to them, they were of incredible value to Lance, if his expression was anything to go by.

The boy took the offered clothes with almost reverence, then looked up at Shiro, as if to confirm they were for him. The man simply smiled, "They're to replace what you currently have. To be honest, your clothes are basically useless now, so we all decided that you needed a new outfit. I was surprised when Keith helped Coran make them, even I wasn't aware that he knew how to stich fabric together."

He saw Lance smirk, no doubt amused by the thought of the normally hot-headed Keith carefully stitching. Shiro had to admit he found the thought quite amusing himself, though he was sure one of the castle's many devices did most of the work in reality.

He pulled out the last item from the bag and put a pair of white sneakers on the floor, "They also made these for you, they'll definitely be better than your current pair."

A slight understatement since Lance's shoes were so worn, they were effectively glorified socks instead of decent footwear, the new pair was far superior.

Lance picked them up and examined them in awe, and Shiro began heading for the door, "Once your changed, head down to the dining room for dinner, we'll simply chuck your old stuff since I don't think there's any way to use it anymore."

He received a nod in response as he disappeared out the door.

* * *

He hadn't actually got that far when Lance ran to catch up to him.

He turned to find the boy already dressed his new clothes, except for the shoes which he was carrying in one hand. Shiro raised an eyebrow in curiosity, "Why haven't you put those on, do they not fit properly?"

Lance shook his head, then waved one of the laces and shrugged, causing both of Shiro's eyebrows to rise in surprise, "Have you never had laces on you shoes before?"

Another shake of the head, then the boy looked at him pleadingly.

It seemed that Lance also didn't know how to tie shoelaces, not something Shiro had thought of but then it was fully possible for the teen to have never been shown how. They didn't know what, if any, family Lance had, and if he'd never had laced shoes, then the need to tie them hadn't existed.

Shiro held his hand out for the shoes, and Lance handed them over.

Bending down, he held the right one out for the teen to quickly put his foot in, he then slowly and obviously began to tie the laces, letting Lance see every step of how it was done. Once done, he gestured to the left, "Why don't you try it?"

Obediently, Lance put on the left shoe and started trying to replicate what Shiro had done. His first attempt ended in a tangled mess, but Shiro simply unpicked it and got him to try again, the second was slightly better, but the teen couldn't quite work out the knot until Shiro guided his hands through the motions.

Job done, they both stood upright and Lance bowed his head slightly in thanks. Shiro felt the sudden urge to ruffle the boy's hair but repressed it and went for a simple approving nod instead. Regardless, this small action caused Lance to beam before moving on ahead for dinner, leaving Shiro with a warm feeling.

Lance was obviously going to need a lot more help than the others, but he felt the boy deserved every bit of assistance they could offer.

* * *

 _ **PS-And there we have it. If anyone has any ideas for future chapters, please let me know. I have got some myself, but more are always welcome. Please let me know what you thought and I'll hopefully update soon.**_


	4. Chapter 4

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello everyone and welcome to another chapter. This one features the dinner scene a couple of people suggested, I'm not entirely sure it's what you wanted but I hope you enjoy it anyway. As I said last chapter, I'm open to suggestions for chapters so please tell me if you have any. Thank you for your continued support, and I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 4**

Lance stared at the plate before him.

It appeared that Hunk had finally found the edibles he'd been after, instead of the green goo they'd been supplied up until now, they had a variety of cooked vegetables.

At least, that's what he thought they were called.

Glancing around the table (did they always have to sit at it to eat?), he saw his fellow humans seemingly in ecstatic's over Hunk's creation, maybe the green goo had really been getting them down as Hunk claimed.

Personally, Lance hadn't cared either way, he'd been too busy getting used to having three full meals a day and the goo had been miles above some of the stuff he'd eaten in the past.

During their first proper meal in the castle, he'd attempted to devour as much as he possibly could, too used to doing so in the rare times he had a chance to in preparation for possible lean times. Initially, the others had heaped as much on his plate as possible, encouraging his gorging, but after a few days, they started restricting his portions more, completely confusing him. Eventually, Shiro explained that they wanted him to eat more to begin with because he'd been so thin and underfed, but now he'd reached a healthy weight, they were attempting to keep him stable there. He no longer had to worry about not eating for long periods since he would definitely get meals at the castle from now on.

While he still had to check himself from time to time, Lance was starting to understand that Shiro meant what he said.

Seeing the joy on the team's faces, as well as the Altean's, Lance prepared to dive in himself, then stopped with his hand above the plate.

That first meal, he'd effectively shovelled the food into his mouth with his hands, the way he'd always done. Hunk had almost immediately stopped him and then shown him how to use the spoon, explaining that that was they way most people ate. This marked Lance's first brush with table manners, and he had a feeling he'd be meeting them a lot.

He looked around the table again, finding that everyone was using two tools he'd yet to encounter.

The knife and fork.

While the spoon fairly easy to master, the knife and fork seemed more complex and he watched the others for a while, trying to work it out.

"Lance?"

Hunk's voice attracted his attention, and he turned to find the other boy looking at him in slight confusion, "Aren't you going to eat?"

Lance hesitated, the more he learned, the more he felt self-conscious about all the 'simple' things he didn't know. He was starting to feel like a bigger and bigger burden to them all.

"It's the knife and fork, isn't it?"

In the time he'd been hesitating, Hunk had reached the answer on his own, and Lance reluctantly nodded.

The other boy grinned, "No sweat, I'll teach you."

With those words, Hunk reached across and grabbed Lance's knife and fork, "Firstly, you hold the fork in this hand like so…"

He placed the fork in Lance's hand, adjusting his fingers around it.

"…and then you hold the knife in the other like this…"

The knife was place in his other hand and arranged into the correct grip.

"…and then just use them like this."

Hunk showed him by spearing one of his vegetables with the fork and holding it in place as he cut it with the knife, then lifted the cut piece into his mouth with the fork, he smiled, "Simple."

Lance quickly copied, finding the technique far easier than he'd thought and proceeded to eat his first ever bite of a proper, cooked for him meal…

Damn that was amazing!

Never, in his entire life, had he ever had anything as good as this. How had Hunk done it? Altean magic, it had to have been.

So, caught up in the delight he was feeling, Lance failed to notice the others staring at him.

* * *

Hunk watched Lance worriedly.

The other boy had frozen, fork in mouth after his first bite, completely unaware of everyone else staring at him.

Coran spoke up first, "Are you alright Number Three?"

Lance didn't even respond with a nod or shake of the head, but he finally pulled the fork away and chewed rapidly. As he did so, Hunk noticed something even stranger.

Lance was actually crying.

Instantly, he began to panic, had his meal not turned out okay? Was it in fact disgusting and everyone else was simply to polite to say so? Did Lance just hate it?

Then he saw the huge smile on the other teen's face and he realised that these were actually tears of happiness.

That threw him a curveball.

While he knew he was a good cook (mostly thanks to his mom's teachings), it hadn't been that much of an exciting dish, just some cooked vegetables with what seasonings he could find. It was actually pretty basic, given his limited choice of ingredients and combinations, but Lance was reacting like it was the highest quality dish in the world.

He frowned, had Lance's experiences been so bad that even a basic meal would bring him to tears? Just what else had he never had?

"Is Lance okay?"

Allura had also noticed the teen's tears, and her question had been directed at Shiro, since Lance was, apparently, too caught up in eating his food to even notice them.

"He's fine princess." Their leader answered quietly, "I think its just the first time he's had a proper meal."

She nodded silently, then looked back at the Blue Paladin with a hint of pity in her eyes.

By this time, Lance had polished off his plate, having eaten voraciously, and blinked in surprise at them, his tears having dried.

Hunk was the first to speak, "You want seconds?"

The other boy nodded furiously and practically thrust his plate in Hunk's direction. With a chuckle, Hunk heaped a generous portion onto the plate and handed it back.

"Just try not to eat the plate, okay."

His little joke went unnoticed by Lance, as he launched straight into his second serving of dinner.

He even had using a knife and fork mastered.

* * *

It was well after dinner, and Keith wandered into the lounge after a personal training session to find Hunk and Pidge huddled together, clearly plotting something.

Shiro had taken Lance to the Blue Lion, having decided to give the boy some one-on-one piloting tutoring, since he was the only one out of them with no knowledge about it whatsoever. Allura and Coran were continuing their checks of all the castle systems and repairing what needed repairing, leaving Keith curious as to what the Green and Yellow Paladins were up to.

Walking over to join them, he found Pidge typing out some sort of list on her laptop, and she looked up as he arrived.

"Keith, perfect! You can give us a hand."

He frowned, "With what?"

Hunk quickly explained, "You see, we're making a list of all the fun things Lance might never have experienced before, we're planning on helping him do as many as possible."

"Why?"

Pidge gave him a look of disapproval, "Keith, remember how he reacted to Hunk's dinner, he's literally never had a proper home-cooked meal before today, heck, he's probably never had a proper meal all his life."

Hunk nodded in agreement, "Right, and it got us thinking about what other things we took for granted he's never had. So, we want to help him experience those things because he more than deserves them."

Keith had to admit, they had a point, and he did want to do what he could for his fellow Paladin.

He sat down beside them, "Okay then, how can I help?"

Pidge shoved the laptop across to him, "Firstly, you can look through what we already have and suggest anything else."

The Red Paladin began reading through the list, finding it to be quite long already. He raised an eyebrow, "Blanket forts?"

Pidge folded her arms, "Of course, who hasn't made a blanket fort!"

Keith shook his head and kept reading until another item caught his eye, "Wait! 'Building with Lego', seriously?"

This time Hunk looked at him disapprovingly, "C'mon Keith, everyone needs to build with Lego at some point, I used to do it all the time."

"But where are we going to get Lego out here?"

"Well, we don't have to do everything on the list out here! Some of it can wait until we get back home." Pidge exclaimed.

Keith blinked, "But we don't know if he'll be able to…"

Hunk interrupted, "Look, we all know that we're not going to let Lance go back out onto the streets when we go home, not after finally giving him something like an actual home."

"I'm certain Shiro will make sure he is properly taken in, even if he has to adopt Lance himself." Pidge added.

"But Shiro is way too young to adopt someone Lance's age!" Keith argued.

She waved her hand dismissively, "Then my family will."

"Or mine." Hunk threw in, "My mom will definitely take him in."

"And if all else fails, I'm sure Coran could adopt him." Pidge finished.

Keith sighed, "Well, I guess you're right." He looked over the list, then frowned, "Hey, you haven't put 'Fishing' on here!"

"Because fishing is boring." Pidge groaned, "All you do is sit there in the wet and cold and wait."

"But I like fishing." The Red Paladin argued, then began typing determinedly, "Well I'm putting it on the list."

Hunk shrugged, "No harm in having it as a suggestion."

The youngest of the trio grumbled, "Sheesh, fill up our fun list with boring."

Keith suddenly stopped typing, "Hang on! 'Winding up Shiro', why is that on here!?"

Pidge stared at him like he was mad, "Seriously, every kid has to wind up whatever parental figure they have at some point." She smiled mischievously, "I'm sure I can teach Lance how to drive Shiro up the wall."

"But Shiro's not his dad."

Hunk rolled his eyes, "Seriously dude, we know where this is going. Lance already goes to Shiro first about things, its obvious that he's going to start seeing him as something like a father, or at least an older brother."

Pidge nodded sagely, "Yep, there's no other way it's going to go."

Keith opened his mouth, about to list the many reasons why it wasn't going to end up that way. Then he thought on the interactions he'd seen between Shiro and Lance and sighed.

"Yeah, you guys are right."

* * *

 _ **PS-So a little extra scene there where the others predict how things are going to go. Please let me know what you thought and any suggestions for future chapters and I'll hopefully update soon.**_


	5. Chapter 5

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello everyone and welcome to another chapter. For this one, I saw LBthebookworm's suggestion of board games and was inspired, resulting in this peek at Team Voltron playing Risk (don't worry, they will still be friends afterwards). Thank for your continued support and chapter suggestions, and I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 5**

How, amongst everything else she'd been doing, Pidge managed to create a replica of Risk, Shiro would never know.

She bounced into the lounge, bursting with excitement, and thrust the box at him, practically shouting.

"Shiro, I've managed to make this, so we have to play it now!"

It took him a moment or two to register what was in front of his face, but he eventually managed a reply, "Is this Risk? Where did you get it?"

"I made it using the castle's fabricators. I had to bypass several layers of code plus reconfigure the…"

"Risk! I haven't played that in ages!"

Keith interrupted Pidge's explanation, as he gazed at the creation joyfully, "I love Risk!"

Hunk glanced at him, "Why doesn't that surprise me…"

"It's about the only time you see him stop and think about something." Shiro said with a playful smirk.

"Hey!" Keith gave a mock glower, "Just because I beat you at it Shiro."

By this point, Lance had become intrigued, and he picked up one of the little figures (seriously, Pidge had even made proper figures for it) and studied it, a question mark showing from his headset.

"It's a board game called Risk." Hunk explained, "Each player chooses a colour and that acts as their army. You play on a board that mimics a map of the world and you can attack countries of an opposing colour to attempt to take that part of the board."

Pidge nodded, "Right, and you're each given a mission at the start of the game the others don't know about, the first player to complete their mission wins. If you're playing 'World Conquest' rules, then the first player to conquer the whole map wins."

Coran and Allura had arrived in time for the explanation, and the royal advisor twirled his moustache thoughtfully, "So its kind of a tactical game."

The princess looked to Pidge, "I assume there's more rules than that."

Pidge smiled, "Of course, there's rules for reinforcements and so on, plus the results of attacking are determined by dice rolls, as well numbers of troops on each side, adding an element of chance."

"Similar to actual combat." Coran rubbed his hands together delightedly, "Well, what are we waiting for? I can't wait to crush you all with my brilliant tactics!"

Shiro grinned, "Well, since this is downtime, I don't see anything wrong with having a game. It'll even double as a type of tactical training."

Allura agreed, her eyes sparkling at the thought of learning an Earth game, "Right, we'll improve while having a little fun."

As Shiro expected, Hunk and Keith were also on board with a game, but Lance raised a hand, a worried look on his face.

"Don't worry Lance, you can team up with me as you learn the game." The Black Paladin assured him.

The boy smiled and nodded.

* * *

After a more in-depth explanation of the rules, Team Voltron were soon prepping their armies.

Naturally, the Paladins chose the colour of their lion, with Shiro and Lance as Joint-Commanders of the black armies, while Allura and Coran shared command of the blue, since they were also playing for the first time. Having opted for missions, Shiro looked at his and Lance's mission card.

 _Destroy all Reds._

So, they had to wipe out Keith, Shiro began formulating a plan as he showed Lance the card.

Though far from fully literate, they had been teaching Lance written English and he could read some words and scribble out some simple sentences.

He gave the boy a minute or two to examine it, then spoke quietly, "Do you understand?"

Lance nodded, likely having only read the word 'red' and worked out the rest from there based on how the game worked. The boy then leaned over the board, frowning in concentration as he tried to come up with a plan himself.

Eventually (after a lengthy whispered debate between Allura and Coran), their starting armies were placed and as the winner of the die roll, Keith went first.

As expected, he started aggressively, shoring up his already strong position in Africa by swiftly removing the single armies in nearby territories, he usually tried to claim a continent early in the game, gaining an advantage over his opponents. However, this could spread his forces thin, potentially helping him and Lance in their mission.

Hunk was next, and his opening move was also aggressive, but with the intention of a more passive overall plan.

He swiftly claimed Australia, the smallest and easiest continent to hold, he then redeployed as many armies as possible to Indonesia, barricading the only route in. Shiro guessed that the Yellow Paladin was attempting to wait them out, slowly building his forces with the reinforcement bonus and striking when everyone was weakened.

Pidge's turn came, and Shiro wasn't sure about her plan.

She'd put as many troops as she could into one territory in Asia, ignoring all her other ones. Then, she attacked a nearby single army, took that territory and stopped there. Though a strange first turn, Shiro decided that they had to keep an eye on her, she likely had a unique scheme in place to throw everyone's game off.

Then came Allura and Coran.

While the starting territories of the red and yellow armies had been more localised, the blue, green and black had been spread across the map, so where the Altean's decided to focus would affect how they approached Keith in Africa.

They'd placed the majority of their forces in Great Britain and took over Iceland and Western Europe, cementing their hold over most of that continent with a decent defence, leaving only Ukraine to claim. They appeared to be attempting to expand out slowly from Europe, likely because they had a continent or territory claiming mission.

Finally, he and Lance got to go.

Naturally, with their mission, they needed to head in the direction of Africa and assault Keith's developing stronghold, unfortunately, the spread of their armies put them some distance from their target. The majority of their strength was in North America and the east of Asia, so the initial plan had been to surround Africa's borders and gradually drive Keith into a corner, creating a battle of attrition. Unfortunately, the blue armies were on most of the routes in, with their expansion across Europe. No doubt that by the time they reached them, Coran and Allura will have built up considerable strength and they wouldn't get past without a bloodbath.

Lance tapped him on the arm, and Shiro looked at him then down at the tablet-like device in his hands.

Pidge had supplied it to him and it held a digital replica of the Risk board, letting Lance sketch out lines and such onto the digital copy so he could give Shiro ideas without broadcasting them to everyone else. While the headset was good, the symbols it produced could be seen by anyone.

The boy circled three points on the map, the sea route from Brazil, the border of the Middle East and Egypt, as well as its sea route to East Africa.

Shiro nodded and gave the boy a proud grin.

If they used those routes in, they could bypass the blue armies entirely, or at least their main power base. Since it was likely Hunk was going to hold down in Australia, they could simply go past and ignore him. Pidge's plan was still a mystery, but it looked like she wouldn't bother them so long as they avoided her little horde, and with little happening in North and South America, they could push southwards and maybe claim some reinforcement bonuses while they were at it.

Plan decided, Shiro placed their reinforcements in Siam and booted out Pidge's single army in India to move on and claim a card.

* * *

Slow and steady was his and Lance's plan, and so far, it was working.

Shiro tended to evenly spread his armies, forming a gradually moving wall that moved along the map, each territory holding enough armies to not look like a mighty force, but still not be worth attacking without reasonable numbers.

Also, with their current plan, they were leaving a single trail of armies behind them, not too concerned with holding bits of Asia and North America. These were capitalised upon by Hunk and Pidge for easy cards, or Allura and Coran who were gradually expanding the blue mass through Asia.

Their Asia forces had pushed their way to the Middle East and were now sat quietly in position. Naturally, Keith had reinforced Egypt and East Africa, but they didn't want to press the attack…yet.

The armies in North America were also making steady progress, having now reached Central America, but had hit a slight snag.

Unfortunately, since he had firm control of Australia, Hunk had expanded his armies from Brazil to almost hold all of South America. He'd also left a formidable force in Venezuela, blocking their path southwards with the potential for a major bloodbath that would severely weaken their black army.

He frowned, they had to push through to Brazil, they'd just have to take the bloodbath and hope they got lucky with the dice.

Lance nudged him and subtly showed him their collected cards, revealing a set that would give them ten reinforcements. More than enough to bolster the North American force to let them overwhelm Hunks defence.

At the start of their turn, Shiro eagerly cashed their cards in, and it wasn't until after their turn ended that he got the feeling that they didn't have the right cards to cash in for anything when they picked up their last card.

* * *

The game had reached its dangerous stage.

With everyone working to claim victory, backstabbing and all out war were the order of the day.

Shiro and Lance had broken through Hunk's defence, taking over South America and fortifying it to slowly build their armies for the assault upon Africa. This had apparently thrown a wrench into the Yellow Paladin's plans, and he overloaded Australia and launched a brutal assault upon Allura and Coran's steadily growing strength in Asia. Keith, who'd been niggling away at the blue's hold on Europe, as well as picking on one army territories in North America for easy cards, cashed in for major reinforcements and struck Western and Southern Europe at the same time. Then, Pidge's steadily growing horde rampaged into Australia, devastating Hunk's power-base and ripping chunks into the blue mass of the Altean armies.

With this all kicking off, Shiro and Lance's hold on their vital entry points into the heart of the red forces had been challenged several times. However, they'd somehow been able to cash in cards regularly, always having the right combinations of cards every time they got three.

Shiro was suspicious.

While unnoticed by the others, he knew it was too convenient, but it wasn't until he paid especially close attention to Lance that he realised how it was happening.

* * *

It was during Keith's turn, as he was attacking one of Allura and Coran's heavily fortified territories, that Shiro noticed it.

Coran got very into the dice rolling, overreacting with exuberance or despair depending on the result, while Allura would stare at them intently, as if to influence the rolls with her mind. This meant that those three were distracted, and with Hunk throwing threats of severe in-game repercussions at Pidge for her devastation of Australia, they weren't paying attention either.

That's when Lance made his move.

The card deck was near to him, and the boy would swiftly slip one of their unwanted cards in and draw a replacement, if it still wasn't one they wanted, he'd wait until everyone was distracted again (which was now happening frequently because Risk always got personal) and repeat the manoeuvre until he got a card they wanted.

The whole thing was so swift and innocuous, you wouldn't notice unless you were intently watching Lance or the cards, and it was deliberately done in a way that wouldn't draw attention. He didn't get extra cards or steal someone else's, he simply swapped out what he already had until he had the desired result.

The sneaky little…

At this point, Shiro should've stopped him, because it was definitely cheating, and they should really be encouraging the boy to play fairly...but Keith was about to overstretch himself and the Black Paladin knew it, so if they got the right reinforcements, they could mop up his leftovers and win the game.

As such, he leaned close to Lance's ear and whispered, "If you get us the right cards for ten reinforcements by our turn, we could win."

* * *

In the end, Keith overstretched as Shiro predicted, and the black armies struck hard and fast with their surge of reinforcements, utterly ruining the red armies and completing their mission.

The Black Paladin smiled at the stunned faces around, Lance looking smug beside him, as Keith sat back in his seat in exasperation, "How did you guys do that!?"

"Good strategy and patience." Shiro replied, while also thinking, 'as well as a little manipulation of the cards'.

Lance simply nodded in agreement, and Shiro sat back as the others all began chattering to each other, revealing their master plans and how the other players had spoiled them.

While he felt a little guilty about allowing their minor bit of cheating, he told himself that it had been Lance's first time playing, and it was a part of every child's life to try a little bit of cheating at board games at least once, the teen just happened to be better at it than most. The fact it allowed him to win as well was merely a fortunate side effect.

Though he'd need to keep a close eye on Lance if they ever played Monopoly.

* * *

 _ **PS-So, Lance is quite good at the slight-of-hand. For those who might think Shiro wouldn't let him cheat, remember they were playing Risk, and all's fair in love and Risk. Please let me know what you thought and any chapter suggestions and I'll hopefully update soon.**_


	6. Chapter 6

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello and welcome to the sixth chapter. This one is inspired by the suggestion from ChocolateMonkey19, I hope its similar to what you wanted. Thank you for your continued support and more suggestions are welcome. I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 6**

It was kind of Hunk who started it.

With the little tablet-like devices they'd been given by Coran, and Pidge working out how to link up her laptop and its vast stores of data to them, he had several of his novels in digital form. Of course, their 'library' was limited to what Pidge had on her laptop, but being the computer lover, she was, that was quite a lot.

Naturally, all of them had raided her collection, downloading any books that they wanted to their own devices, but Hunk had probably taken the most, since he was quite fond of reading.

Ideally, he'd read from an actual, made from paper, book, but with none available, digital was better than not reading at all, so he made do. So, when he wasn't experimenting in the kitchen, or helping Pidge with her projects, or even undertaking some of his own, he would be sat on a comfy couch somewhere, reading away.

Then Lance found him during one of these times.

The other boy had been slowly spending more time with them all individually. Initially, he'd kept to himself, probably a bit uncomfortable with being around the same people constantly after living alone for so long, but he'd started seeking others out more often.

Hunk wondered if it was because he was becoming more and more curious about what they could teach him, or because he was starting to see them as friends.

Regardless, Lance probably spent the most time with him, after Shiro, and he'd often hung around the kitchen as Hunk experimented and had even helped out from time to time.

The Blue Paladin wandered over and glanced at the device's screen, the symbols from his headset asking what Hunk was reading.

Hunk smiled, "Oh, just a sci-fi novel."

Question mark.

"You know, Science Fiction, it means it's a story set in a made-up universe, usually involving spaceships and things." He then frowned, "Though it seems kinda tame considering what we're actually doing out here."

Lance peered at the words on the screen, probably trying to see which ones he could actually read.

Since becoming Team Voltron, they'd all been trying to give the boy some sort of schooling, mainly in the basics. Pidge had taken on teaching him maths, Keith largely helped him with his physical education, Shiro was giving him pilot training for his role as a Paladin, as well as assisting with other fields, and Hunk ended up focusing on his literacy.

In all honesty, he probably had the easiest time, since Lance understood spoken word no problem, he could just use the method of reading out loud and pointing at the words as he did so. The hardest part was working out when the other boy had learned a word, since Lance couldn't speak, he couldn't read the words aloud himself to prove he could read them. Instead, they had to rely on him projecting the right symbols to describe the word he was reading.

Despite this, they were making progress, slow progress, but progress.

Struck by an idea, Hunk closed the page, and brought up another one of his books. At Lance's questioning look, he smiled, "I thought, since you're here, I could read to you and you could try and follow along, to help you learn the words."

In hindsight, he wondered why he hadn't done this before. He'd mostly been writing out simple sentences for Lance to follow, but you truly learned how to use written word by reading something like a novel, where the language was manipulated in many different ways. As a bonus, it helped them get started on another item on the list he, Pidge, and Keith had created (though he was certain that Shiro had added some things to it secretly as well).

Introducing Lance to Harry Potter.

The Blue Paladin considered it for a moment, then sat himself right beside Hunk and peered at the screen, ready for him to start.

Smiling, Hunk did just that, putting on his best storytelling voice (along with voices for all the characters), and launched into 'Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'*. As he read, he watched Lance's face out the corner of his eye, seeing all the reactions upon the teen's expressive face.

He saw Lance glower at the nastiness of the Dursleys, pull a face of confusion then curiosity at the mysterious letters, grin with delight at the letter flood scene, and widen his eyes in shock at the arrival of Hagrid.

It was at this point that Pidge arrived.

* * *

"Hey guys!"

Naturally, the girl came in right at a good part, and Lance actually shot her a brief look of annoyance at her for interrupting them.

She blinked in surprise, then looked at them both inquisitively, "What are you guys reading?"

"Harry Potter." Hunk answered casually.

There was a pause.

"What!" She gaped at him, "And you didn't tell me! I would've dropped everything and been right up if you'd said you were reading it aloud!"

She instantly shot across the room and settled on Hunk's other side, even as he apologised, "Sorry Pidge, it was kind of a spontaneous idea."

"Never mind." She waved her hand at the device in Hunk's hands, "Just carry on reading, this is a good bit."

And so, Hunk continued.

* * *

Just as they were at the Kings Cross section, Keith turned up.

"How's it going everyone?"

"Keith!" Pidge snapped at him.

He frowned, "Erm…sorry?"

She waved towards the seat next to her, "Don't worry about it, just get over here."

Bewildered, the Red Paladin did just that, "Okay…what's going on?"

"Hunk's reading the first Harry Potter to us, and we're at the Kings Cross bit." Pidge succinctly answered.

"Huh?"

She glared at him, "He's doing it to help Lance with his reading, now be quiet and enjoy the story."

Effectively bullied into it, Keith settled down in his seat and went quiet, letting Hunk carry on reading.

* * *

Later, Shiro wandered past the room and did a double take at the scene inside.

The other four Paladins all on the same couch, listening intently as Hunk brought the first Harry Potter alive with his voice.

He lingered in the doorway, unnoticed by the four teens as he watched them with a smile.

Hunk had really thrown himself into it, moving his free hand about in dramatic gestures and voicing the characters, with Pidge doing a few voices herself. From time to time, Keith and Pidge would be on their feet, acting a scene out as Hunk read it, the Green Paladin somehow coaxing the normally reserved Red Paladin into it.

But Lance was the best of all.

He listened with rapt attention, reacting to every scene and sentence like a child would, eyes wide with surprise, or a mouth grinning in delight, or leaning in closer with anticipation at more tense parts.

His reactions seemed to only spur the others more, and Shiro stealthily recorded the whole thing, deciding that it was far too wonderful to not record, and slipped away quietly, leaving the four teens to it.

They deserved the time to just be kids after all.

* * *

Afterwards, Hunk's Storytelling Time (as named by Pidge) became a regular occurrence, even when Lance reached the stage where he could read himself.

They worked their way through the Harry Potter series, and even though Coran, Allura and Shiro were well aware of the sessions, they didn't join them.

They felt that it was something special to the four young Paladins, and the way it helped Lance bond with his peers could not be denied. Instead, they started shifting things around to give them the space to have their storytelling time, especially after a hard mission or fight.

If they noticed, they never said anything, and as the war with the Galra continued, Hunk's Storytelling Time became precious.

* * *

 _ ***Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, for those who know it as that. I'm not sure what title is used in what countries, so I went with the one we have in the UK.**_

 _ **PS-So, there is the start of Hunk's Storytelling Time. Please let me know what you thought, as well as any chapter suggestions, and I hope to update soon.**_


	7. Chapter 7

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello all and welcome to the seventh chapter. This one is one of my own ideas and it kind of ran off in its own direction. Thank you those who've shown their support and made suggestions for this fic, and I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 7**

Strangely enough, it was Keith who brought it up.

It was during a post training rest, with all of them gathered in the lounge, when the Red Paladin broke the usual tired silence from his position on the couch.

"Lance, how old are you?"

The boy in question sat up from his sprawled position on the floor, and stared at Keith for a moment, confused by the sudden question.

Pidge, who was sat next to Keith, started to look thoughtful, "Actually, that's a good question." She glanced at him, "I'm surprised none of us thought to find that out until now." She frowned, "Though I guess that you might not really know…"

Lance nodded in agreement, with a lack of knowledge about numbers, and no real way of keeping track, he didn't know how old he was. He thought hard, had his mom told him his age at some point? Even if she did, she died so long ago he couldn't possibly remember what she might've said.

"Well, how old do you think you are?"

Hunk joined the conversation from the other couch, and Lance simply shrugged.

Pidge studied him intently, the way she'd study some new piece of tech, "Well, from your appearance, you have to at least be a teenager."

"But that still leaves nearly a decade of possibilities." Hunk added.

By this point, Coran and Allura were intrigued, and the male Altean threw in his thoughts from where he was standing behind the princess' seat, "Well, I know that your human lifespans are different from Altean ones, but surely its fairly easy to narrow down his age from his physical development."

Shiro smiled slightly from his position beside Hunk, "Narrowing down an exact year is harder with teenagers." He explained, "Humans develop at slightly different rates, so one eighteen-year-old could look like an adult while another eighteen-year-old still appears to be a child. In some cases, a boy might not physically be a full adult until his twenties."

Allura looked to the Black Paladin, "Well, how old do you think he is Shiro?"

He stuttered slightly, "Umm…well…maybe around Keith's age, possibly younger?"

By this time, Pidge had moved so she was right in Lance's face, staring intently, "I think that's a reasonable assumption, I'm pretty sure he's older than me, and I don't think he's nearly as old as you are Shiro."

"What do you mean 'nearly as old'!?" The Black Paladin gave her a mock glare, "You make it sound like I'm an old man or something."

She grinned slyly but didn't respond as she returned to her previous seat. Meanwhile, Hunk spoke up, "Hey guys, I think how old he isn't the important issue here."

All eyes turned upon him in confusion, and the Yellow Paladin spread his arms wide, "The real issue is deciding when his birthday will be!"

For their part, Shiro, Lance and the two Altean's looked bemused, but Pidge and Keith looked like Hunk had just revealed to them a great epiphany.

"You're so right!" Pidge exclaimed, "Lance has to decided on that as soon as possible!"

"Agreed." Keith looked to Lance, "Firstly, what season do you want it to be in?"

Lance looked between them, completely baffled. What were they talking about when they said 'birthday'?

Upon seeing the symbols projected to represent his question, Pidge practically leapt to her feet, her voice almost a shriek, "What!" She pointed at him in determination, "Right, there's no way I can let this continue. We are going to throw you a big birthday party to make up for the last however-many-years of no birthdays!"

"Agreed!"

Hunk and Keith spoke as one, as determined as Pidge, and Shiro moved to try and prevent things from getting out of hand, probably thinking they were going to start partying right there and then, "Guys, while I understand that you have good intentions, maybe stop for a moment."

"Shiro!" Pidge stared him down, "How can we not do something about this? There's no way you can simply say no when its clear that Lance has never had a birthday celebration in his life. We can not let him miss out on this vital part of childhood!"

Their leader sighed, "That's not what I'm saying Pidge. Remember, we're the Paladins of Voltron and we are a vital part of the fight against the Galra. Plus, we don't really have the supplies to throw a massive birthday party at the moment…"

"Can't we at least make him a cake?" Hunk offered.

"Yeah, and we can all help make it for him." Keith added.

Shiro smiled, "Okay, we can do that."

"And if we magically find something like a space mall, I'm buying him the best birthday present ever!" Pidge declared.

"Not if my one for him is better." Keith challenged.

"Yeah, well I'm going to get him a present that's so good, it'll make all of your ones look awful." Hunk threw in.

"Okay, okay, why don't you three just go and get started on the cake." Shiro suggested.

At his words, the three basically charged for the door, Hunk lingering behind for just a moment, "Lance, do not come into the kitchen under any circumstances, not until we say you can."

Not waiting for his response, he ran after the others and vanished.

* * *

A while later, Lance and Shiro were sat by themselves in the lounge, Allura and Coran having decided to join the cake making party.

The Black Paladin had taken it upon himself to properly explain about birthday celebrations to the confused teen, and since then, Lance had been thoughtful.

He seemed rather perplexed by the whole thing, as if he was having difficulty understanding why the others got so worked up about it, and Shiro suspected it was because he didn't quite realise it was because they cared about him.

His heart went out to him, the same way it went out to Keith when he'd been dismissed as a 'discipline case', despite showing blatant, and incredible, talent. Here was another boy who'd been dealt a rubbish hand by life and he'd definitely developed protective instincts for him, for all of them really.

He had a sudden idea and stood.

Lance looked up at his movements and Shiro gestured with his head, "Hey Lance, while we're waiting for them to finish that cake, there's something I want to show you."

The boy gave him a confused eyebrow but stood as well, following the man out the room and up to Shiro's quarters.

The moment they entered, Shiro strode across to one of the draws, and carefully pulled out a small disc-like object. It was a miniature holo-projector, one of many the castle had spare, and he'd put into it a single projection.

Clicking the button on the side to turn it on, he turned to Lance to show him the image.

It had been taken from one of the castle's security feeds and showed the paladins after a particularly good training exercise with the lions, early on in their time in space.

Lance was in the centre of the group, smiling broadly as Hunk had an arm draped around his shoulders, laughing at something. Pidge was opposite the Yellow Paladin, on Lance's right and she was in the middle of jokingly berating the two boys, a smirk on her face. Just behind them was Keith, eyes alight with joy and mouth open in a huge grin as he said something (a quick quip if Shiro remembered correctly), while Shiro himself had a small smile as he was ruffling the Blue Paladin's hair proudly.

It had been the day when Lance had pulled off a particular manoeuvre with the Blue Lion, a basic one for pilots and known by the others, but difficult for a novice. It had been Lance's first achievement since Shiro had begun training him and the pride the others had in him was evident in the picture.

Lance took the picture and stared at it, even as Shiro spoke.

"Everyone was so happy for you that day, all of them were singing your praises and saying how quickly you'd learned and improved, considering you started completely from scratch." He squeezed the teen's shoulder, "We were all so proud that day, and every day since."

The boy looked up, slight shock on his face, and Shiro ruffled his hair, "Since you're owed several years' worth of birthday presents, I want you to have it. As a reminder of what you mean to us Lance."

Lance's eyes widened, and his mouth opened slightly, then he flung his arms around Shiro and tightly hugged him.

Since he'd met them, the teen had never openly initiated a hug, regardless, Shiro naturally returned the embrace.

"I know we don't know your age or even what date you were born but, Happy Birthday Lance."

* * *

By the time they'd returned to the lounge, the others were ready and waiting with the cake.

Somehow, they'd managed to create a cake replica of the Blue Lion, complete with candles (though he had no idea where they got them from). This was accompanied by a raucous (and very off-key) rendition of 'Happy Birthday' as Hunk held the cake before Lance.

"And now, you blow out the candles and make a wish."

With a grin, Lance did as asked, and everyone cheered.

Then Keith spoke up, "So, what did you wish for?"

Pidge smacked him on the arm, "You can't ask him that dummy! If he tells us, then it won't come true."

Hunk shook his head in disappointment, "Seriously dude, everyone knows that."

As it quickly devolved into a joking argument, Lance watched them all with a smile.

To be honest, he didn't quite get this caring for each other stuff, but he was starting to believe that no one really understood it, they just did it. He may not get basic things, and he may seem far behind the others, but he felt that they really didn't mind. He had no knowledge of his exact age, no idea as to when his birthday should be, but he had decided on when it would be celebrated.

On the same date as the Blue Lion took him from Earth and into this new life.

* * *

 _ **PS-So, it kind of ran into family fluff stuff, but I think that's going to be a theme for this story, so what the hey. Please let me know what you thought and any chapter suggestions.**_


	8. Chapter 8

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello everyone and welcome to another chapter. This one uses the blanket forts as put on Pidge and Hunk's list in chapter four and is just general silliness. Thank you for your continued support and chapter suggestions, and I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 8**

When Allura entered the lounge, she was rather taken aback by what she saw.

The main couch was completely covered by a complex construction of pillows, cushions and blankets, arranged like some sort of fortified tent, and while she couldn't see who was responsible, she had a good idea as to the culprits.

"Paladins, what are you doing?"

"Halt, who goes there!?"

The very familiar voice of Pidge confirmed one of those involved, though it did little to answer Allura's question.

"Princess Allura."

"What's the password!?"

The Altean blinked, then frowned in confusion, "The password?"

"No password, no entry!"

Pidge's response carried a note of finality, and the princess raised an eyebrow, "Excuse me?"

"You heard me." The Green Paladin answered, "If you do not know the password, then you are clearly an enemy of the Grand Kingdom of the Left Arm!"

"I thought it was the Grand Kingdom of the Left Leg?"

Hunk's slightly indignant voice emerged from the pile of blankets, then there was a momentary pause before he spoke again, "Lance voted for it being the Grand Kingdom of the Blue-Yellow Alliance."

"But I was the one who designed the fort, surely I can choose the name of our great coalition!" Pidge protested, "Besides, Lance's idea only includes him and you in it, Hunk."

Another pause, then Hunk answered, "That's a great idea Lance, we can call ourselves the Grand Kingdom of the Voltron Non-Adults."

"Agreed." Pidge's voice then addressed Allura, "Okay then, since you don't know the password, Princess Allura, you are likely an enemy of the Grand Kingdom of the Voltron Non-Adults!"

The princess sighed, and left the room, deciding to let Shiro handle whatever nonsense the three paladins were doing.

* * *

Inside the fort, Hunk listened for a moment then shrugged.

"I think she's gone."

Pidge, tapping away at her laptop, nodded firmly, "Good, if she'd attempted an assault upon us, we would've been forced to take drastic measures, right High King Lance?"

Lance, currently sat cross-legged with a paper crown sat regally upon his head, smiled in assent as he folded two paper hats for his compatriots. One finished, he handed it to Hunk as Pidge spoke to the Yellow Paladin, "How are our munitions, First-Knight Hunk?"

Hunk carefully put on the hat, "Very good, Chief Advisor Pidge. We have twenty pillows, fifteen cushions, nearly a hundred bits of scrunched up paper and one rolled up duvet as last resort heavy artillery."

The Green Paladin nodded in approval, "Excellent, do you not agree High King Lance?"

Lance grinned and handed Pidge her finished paper hat, which she put on at a jaunty angle.

"Guys, what are you doing."

Keith's voice came in from outside, and this time, Hunk called out to him.

"Halt, who approaches the capital of the Grand Kingdom of the Voltron Non-Adults!?"

There was a long silence, probably as Keith tried to work out how to answer, "Umm…Keith, the Red Paladin."

Hunk faced Lance, his face etched with seriousness, "High King Lance, this Keith is technically a non-adult, shall we grant him passage into our realm?"

Lance frowned, his face creased in thought. Eventually, he gave a nod of assent, and Hunk addressed Keith once more, "Sir Keith, High King Lance has graciously granted the chance of asylum within our realm. You may shelter here from our great foe, the Ancient Empire of the Voltron Adults."

With dramatic flair, he opened a gap between two cushions, creating a space for Keith to crawl through. The boy did so, though he was clearly slightly confused as to what was going on.

"Seriously guys, what are you doing?"

Pidge gazed upon him seriously, "Sir Keith, this is the capital of the Grand Kingdom of the Voltron Non-Adults. From here we are holding out against the tyranny of the Ancient Empire of the Voltron Adults, who have long held this beautiful Country of Lions under their oppressive rule."

The Red Paladin just stared, "Really guys?"

Hunk looked to Lance, "High King, our newest ally requires a title, perhaps you would wish to bestow one upon him?"

Once again, Lance looked thoughtful for a while, then he smiled again and quickly scribbled something on the third paper hat he'd just finished folding before holding it out to them. The handwriting was awful, and most of it was spelt wrong, but it was legible enough for Pidge twitch her glasses in approval, "An excellent idea High King, the title suits our new friend perfectly."

She looked to Keith, "High King Lance has granted you a most honourable position, from now on, you shall be known as Spymaster Keith, please accept this noble garb as a sign of your new position."

With a ceremonial air, Lance placed the paper hat upon Keith's head, as Pidge and Hunk applauded the appointment.

With the formalities over with, Lance gave Keith his first instructions as Spymaster.

"Wait, you want me to sneak into the kitchen and steal the cookie like things Hunk made this morning?"

Lance nodded firmly and grinned as Hunk smiled eagerly, "It's a great idea, we need supplies if we're to outlast the Ancient Empire of the Voltron Adults."

Pidge twitched her glasses, "I agree, supplies are vital if we are to be victorious."

Looking between them disbelievingly, Keith eventually sighed.

"Fine, I'll see what I can do."

* * *

Much later, Shiro came into the lounge.

He'd realised that he hadn't seen the other Paladins that day, except for a training session with Keith that morning, and he was curious as to what they were up to.

This wasn't quite what he expected, though at the same time, it kind of was.

True, he hadn't expected to find a large blanket fort gracing the main lounge right at that particular moment, but he had expected to find the kids up to something. In all honesty, this was precisely something they would do when bored, especially since 'blanket forts' had been an item on the list three of them had written.

"Halt and identify yourself!"

At Hunk's commanding voice, Shiro stopped and answered with a smile, "Shiro, Paladin of the Black Lion."

There followed a discussion within the fort, which Shiro listened to with amusement.

"High King Lance, do we allow passage?"

Hunk's question was followed by silence, probably because Lance was answering, and Keith's voice came next, "C'mon, why not? Its Shiro!"

"But he is part of the Ancient Empire of the Voltron Adults." Pidge argued, "Therefore we cannot allow him into our stronghold."

"Really guys, don't you think this is getting a little ridiculous?" Keith responded.

As the argument continued, Shiro heard someone else enter the lounge and turned to see Coran heading his way, "Ah, Shiro. Do you know what happened to those cookies Hunk had in the kitchen...?"

The Altean trailed off as he saw the construction before him, "Erm…what is going on?"

Shiro shrugged, "They've just made a blanket fort, it's a pretty common thing for young humans to do from time to time."

Coran twirled his moustache thoughtfully, "I see." He then turned back to Shiro, "Anyway, the cookies have vanished from the kitchen."

The Black Paladin raised an eyebrow, "Have they now?" He threw a knowing glance to the, now silent, blanket fort, "I wonder where they went?"

Coran quickly caught on, and faced the fort, his arms on his hips, "Right you scallywags! Relinquish those cookies!"

"Never!" Hunk yelled back defiantly, "We'll never give in to the Ancient Empire of the Voltron Adults!"

Coran narrowed his eyes, "If that's how you want it." He spun to Shiro, "Number one, we must go and gather supplies. Our assault upon our foes must be a success!"

Slightly taken aback by how quickly the Altean had joined the game, but not wanting to be the one to ruin it, Shiro nodded, "Whatever you say."

* * *

When Allura returned to the lounge, she found it looking more like…well…a warzone was an apt description.

As well as the original blanket creation, a second one had appeared at the opposite end of the room, though it was more akin to a blanket barricade than a tent. Peering over it was Coran and Shiro, and between their barricade and the other Paladin's tent, was a mess of pillows, cushions and rolled up paper.

She looked to her aide and the leader of Voltron, "What is going on here?"

"Princess." Coran gestured at her frantically, "Quickly, you need to join us in our bid to reclaim the cookies stolen by the Kingdom of the Voltron Non-Adults!"

"That's _Grand_ Kingdom of the Voltron Non-Adults!" Pidge corrected him loudly, "And we will prevail against the tyranny of the Ancient Empire of the Voltron Adults!"

At this point, she should have tried to bring a halt to this childishness, or simply turned around and left them to it. However, Coran had said cookies, and having tasted the wonderous creations of Hunk for herself, she knew they were worth it.

As such she faced the other fort, "Rebels of the Kingdom of the Voltron Non-Adults. I am Princess Allura of the Ancient Empire of the Voltron Adults, and we shall reclaim the cookies you have so heinously stolen from us!"

Her piece said, she swiftly shot across to join Shiro and Coran, gathering as many pillows and cushions as possible on her way.

* * *

Thus, the war between the Grand Kingdom of the Voltron Non-Adults and the Ancient Empire of the Voltron Adults over the great treasure known as 'cookies', lasted for some time…until they realised that the Alliance of Voltron Mice had snuck into the room and stolen them while everyone else was distracted by the war.

* * *

 _ **PS-And so, the mice are the true winners. Please let me know what you thought, as well as anymore chapter suggestions.**_


	9. Chapter 9

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello all, and welcome to this rather delayed chapter. This one looks at the 'Fall of the Castle of Lions' episode, and 'The Tears of the Balmera', since they cover the same event. Its more of a swift dive through so assume that what you don't see pretty much happens as it does in the actual show. Thank you for your continued support, and I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 9**

Lance sat alone in the Castle's large control room, gazing absently up at the crystal that dominated the ceiling.

The Arusians they'd protected were currently in celebration alongside the Alteans and other Paladins, but Lance had ended up leaving the party.

Partly, this was due to the attention from all the Arusians, he wasn't used to being the centre of attention, in fact, his survival had depended on being the opposite of that. Luckily, he shared the spotlight with the other Paladins, allowing him to hide behind them if he needed to. This meant that he thought he could manage, but something else had caused him to go.

Family interactions.

He'd seen an Arusian mother lovingly praising her children after their little recreation of Voltron's victory, and it had caused something to stir in him.

His relationship with his mother had been…difficult to describe. While she didn't hate him, she didn't really seem to greatly care for him either, she barely seemed to care for life at all if he was completely honest.

He never knew what had caused her to end up on the street, she never told him, but she had become resigned to her life, like she believed she didn't deserve any better. By the time Lance was born, his mother had long been selling herself for money, the city providing many people willing to have her 'services'. However, the very things she did to help them survive, slowly killed her from within, until one day, her physical body finally followed suite, leaving Lance behind.

This meant, that there was very little 'love' in their relationship, but her death still left an ache within him that never completely faded.

The sound of the doors opening drew him out of his thoughts and he glanced around to see Coran entering.

"Ah, Number Three, what brings you away from the party?"

Lance simply looked away again, unsure as how to answer.

For his part, Coran simply stood next to him, "Not used to all the attention you're getting?"

Lance looked up in surprise, Coran seemed far more perceptive than he appeared.

The Altean gave a small smile, "Though something tells me that's not everything."

The boy glanced down at the floor, unsure whether or not the headset could project symbols to explain it, since he couldn't in his own head.

Once again, Coran perceived well enough, "Don't worry about trying to explain it if you can't." He stared up at the crystal, "I wondered if you were missing home, but I get the feeling there isn't much there that you particularly miss." He looked at the teen, "But I suppose you could be wondering if there's something you're supposed to be missing."

Once again, Lance was surprised, and in that moment, he realised just how experienced Coran was. He seemed to be such a bumbler, but the Altean was likely older than all the Paladins put together, since they already knew that Alteans lived longer than humans, he'd seen a lot while serving King Alfor.

Coran turned to face him fully, "I suggest you don't dwell on it too much, you might find it taking away from what you have now."

Lance stared, then smiled, he wasn't sure if the man's words had helped, but he felt better. He stood up and gestured to the door, and Coran clapped his hands, "Indeed, back to the party!"

They walked to the door side by side, Pidge's hacked drone Rover passing them by. The teen stopped, instincts from surviving on the streets telling him something was wrong.

Rover was there, but not Pidge…

On impulse, he dived towards Coran, shielding the man just as the drone exploded, he felt a surge of heat and pain…

Then he was gone.

* * *

Pain, fuzzy, burning pain.

Lance forced his eyes open, mind numb and blank.

What happened, how was he here? Something happened on the bridge, but what was it?

His eyes worked slowly, and his mind even slower, gradually taking in the sight before him. A Galra, Keith, Allura and Pidge, the Green Paladin grasped in some large claw.

Then his mind rocketed into high gear.

He summoned his bayard, aimed at the claw and fired, freeing Pidge and distracting the Galra. His head then fell back, the following fight becoming white noise as he lay in exhaustion, until Keith appeared over him.

"Lance, can you hear me?"

Lance blinked, then managed a small nod, seeing the faces of the others gathering over him. He vaguely registered someone holding him up and he managed a smile at their concerned and relieved faces.

For some reason, his earlier thoughts of his mother came to mind, and he wondered if the care he was seeing was how it was supposed to be in a family.

As he felt himself blacking out once more, he grinned.

If so, he thought they were a good family.

* * *

Shiro eyed the cryo-pod impatiently.

Allura had told them Lance would be in there for roughly one Earth day (give or take, since Altean time measurements were slightly different), and was due to wake up any second.

He looked back at her, "Can't we get him out yet?"

She shook her head, "Just a few more ticks."

"How long is that?" Hunk asked, equally impatient.

"It means he'll wake up any time now." Coran answered confidently, "We just want to be absolutely sure that he's healed."

The princess smiled, "Trust us Paladins, we wouldn't keep him in there any longer than we had to."

Pidge was effectively pressed against the pod's glass, "C'mon, open up already."

The pod hissed and clunked, and the girl jumped back as it opened, releasing Lance.

The teen stumbled forward, right into Shiro's waiting arms. Immediately, everyone swarmed around him, as he blinked groggily at them, raising a quizzical eyebrow, but received no informative reply as Hunk yanked him out of Shiro's arms into a hug.

"Lance, you're back!"

Keith grasped the Blue Paladin's shoulder, "You really had us worried there."

Pidge joined the hug, sandwiching Lance between her and Hunk, "Glad to see you feeling better."

As they piled on the boy, Shiro watched fondly, until Allura stated that the boy needed something to eat. He stepped forward, "I need to speak with him a moment, we'll catch up to you."

They stared in confusion, but Coran seemed to have an understanding, "C'mon you lot, let's get some grub sorted for him."

The Altean shepherded the others out, leaving the two paladins alone.

Shiro remained silent for a moment, then spoke, "Lance, Coran told me what you did on the bridge, how you shielded him from the explosion."

The boy's eyes widened, then filled with uncertainty, and Shiro weighed his next words carefully, "What you did was brave, and noble, but it also scared us, all of us."

And that was no exaggeration, especially when the crisis was over. Coran felt incredibly guilty and was unlikely to let the boy do anything remotely strenuous anytime soon, Allura had certainly kept a far too close an eye on the cryo-pod as it did its work, and everyone else hadn't left the sickbay the whole time he was recovering, except when Hunk grabbed them all food.

Personally, Shiro been close to his wits end, not taking his eyes off the pod, lest something happened when he did, and he definitely wanted to protect Lance, and the others, as well as he could.

The man kept his eyes fixed on their least experienced member, learning fast despite everything stacked against him, "We don't want to see you so hurt Lance, and although I know that we'll all have to make snap decisions like you did then in the future, please try and keep yourself safe, for all of us."

He smiled, and then pulled the boy into a tight hug, "Because there's no way we're going to let you go."

In the embrace, Lance smiled softly.

* * *

 _ **PS-Some nice Space Dad fluff at the end there, as well as a little hint as to what Lance's mother was like in this AU at the beginning. Please let me know what you thought as well as any chapter suggestions, this fic will probably skip around the timeline so don't worry about chronology.**_


	10. Chapter 10

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello all and welcome to another chapter. This is a shorter, sillier one, and it has a bit of creative Lance. Thank you for your continued support, and I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 10**

Galra cells were decidedly boring, with too much purple lighting.

Lance drummed his fingers idly, staring up at the ceiling as he waited for his captors to do something.

It had been a careless mistake on his part, he didn't pay quite enough attention and he and Blue ended up caught in the tractor beam of a battlecruiser. The Galra were swift to pull them both aboard and take advantage of Blue's temporary loss of function to swoop in and cart Lance off to the cells, where he'd sat ever since.

The door swished open, allowing entry for several sentries and officers, and a pompous looking Galra who was probably the commander.

The Commander puffed himself up to his full height (unimpressive since he probably only came up to Lance's chest at most), and sneered at him, "Paladin scum, you will share everything you know about Voltron with the Galra Empire!"

The teen might've felt intimidated, if it wasn't for the fact the Commander spoke in a high, squeaky voice that was, frankly, hilarious to hear.

Instead, Lance raised an eyebrow and glanced the Commander up and down, annoying said Commander.

"You are my prisoner, and you will speak!"

Now, there was one obvious difficulty with this order, even if Lance felt so inclined as to betray his team (which he didn't), he wouldn't be able to tell them anything anyway, muteness and all that.

The boy shrugged, and the Commander turned purple (impressive, considering he was already that colour).

"Speak, or I will make you!"

Suddenly, Lance was struck by a genius idea, and while completely unafraid of Commander Squeakums (as he'd now dubbed the Commander), the teen moved back fearfully.

Squeakums grinned, seeing a perceived weakness in his prisoner, "Tell me what I want to know, or I will bring forth horrors your primitive mind could not hope to imagine."

Lance nodded in fake fear, then quickly began miming his muteness.

The Commander stared in bewilderment, "What are you doing?"

The teen quickly repeated the pantomime, emphasising his motions comically, until one of the other officers spoke up, "Sir, I don't think he can actually speak."

Lance immediately pointed at him and nodded furiously, causing the Commander to raise an eyebrow, "What!" He looked at the boy disdainfully, "So we've ended up with the simpleton of the group."

The teen held back the scowl, he was pretty sure who the stupid one in this room really was, and it definitely wasn't him. Instead, he began another pantomime, and the Commander watched intently.

"One…one wave? One note…one letter...? One word!?"

Lance vigorously nodded and moved on.

"Two…two boxes…two bowls…two fish!"

"Sir, its two parts!"

One of the officers called out and Squeakums glared at him, "Of course, I was about to say that precise thing." He turned back to his prisoner, "So, one word, two parts. Continue boy."

Lance obliged.

"So, first part. Shock, shiver…pain…"

* * *

And so, it went for some time, in which the Galra had only managed to guess 'Voltron' the fact it was Altean, and had five Paladins, all bits of information the Empire already had.

Regardless, Commander Squeakums continued with his 'interrogation', the Galra having convinced themselves that Lance was 'simple' thus thinking that they would get to useful information eventually. Of course, Lance was playing them like a well-stringed instrument and successfully distracting them until the inevitable rescue happened.

The first indication of which was explosions, lots of them.

The Galra in Lance's cell leapt to their feet (having sat down over the course of Lance's pantomimes), Commander Squeakums shrilly demanding a situation report from the bridge.

It was of no surprise to hear that the other four lions and the Castle had all arrived and were doing a very good job of busting into the battlecruiser.

Lance casually braced himself against the cell wall as another explosion rocked the ship, causing Squeakums to fall on his rear. He watched in interest as the Commander shrieked orders from his undignified position on the floor and his officers scurried about like headless chickens.

Then, the familiar sounds of Shiro's arm and Keith's sword could be heard and destroyed pieces of sentry flew past the cell door, closely followed by unconscious Galra. Squeakums was on his feet once more, and as he squealed more orders, Lance made his own move.

In one fluid motion, he shot to the Commander and executed a magnificent roundhouse kick that Allura had taught him, sending Squeakums soaring out the door to land in an unconscious heap.

Instantly, Shiro was there, and Lance barely had time to smile and wave before he was swept up in a hug.

"Lance, are you hurt!?"

The teen managed a nod and raised an eyebrow over Shiro's shoulder at Keith giving the downed Commander an unnecessary kick.

The Red Paladin quickly glanced him over in concern, then spoke quickly, "We need to go!"

Shiro released the Blue Paladin, "Agreed, let's go."

As he turned, Lance swiftly tapped him on the shoulder and pointed at the cameras, and Shiro (having quickly learned to translate the boy's requests even without the headset) looked confused.

"You want us to copy the footage from the cameras?"

The teen nodded, and the man shrugged and spoke into his helmet, "You got that Pidge?"

Likely receiving an affirmative, he nodded then led the way, "Let's move Paladins."

* * *

Lance's welcome back to the Castle was pretty…over the top.

The moment he stepped out of Blue (who'd refused to let him out until she was sure he was okay), he was practically crushed by Hunk's hug and then smashed in from the other side by Pidge. When they'd finally let him go, he was swept up by Coran who then basically dragged him to the kitchen for food, everyone else close behind. While Keith hadn't been part of the hug fest, Lance did notice that he'd barely gone more than five feet away from him and that Shiro was hovering close by protectively as well.

Eventually, they were all gathered round the table (Lance firmly between Shiro and Keith), and when they were all satisfied that he wasn't harmed in anyway, Pidge spoke up, "So Lance, why did you want us to copy the footage from the cameras?"

The Blue Paladin grinned and his, now in place, headset helped him explain.

Shiro gaped, "Wait, you managed to trick the Galra into playing Charades with you while a prisoner!?"

Keith shook his head with a smirk, "Of course he did."

For her part, Pidge looked excited, "We need to see this." She stood dramatically on her seat, "To the bridge!"

Hunk blinked, "Why do we need to watch it there?"

"Because it has the biggest projector in the Castle!" She exclaimed, "This deserves nothing but the best for viewing."

With that, she leapt off her seat and shot out the room, there was a beat…and then everyone else ran after her, Hunk yelling after her.

"Wait up Pidge, we want to see it too!"

They spent the next little while laughing hysterically as they watched the footage of Lance's game of Charades with the Galra.

* * *

 _ **PS-Thus Lance plays Charades with the Galra. Please let me know what you thought, as well as any suggestions for future chapters.**_


	11. Chapter 11

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello all and welcome to another chapter. This one has a bit more Paladin interaction, as well as some insight into this AU's past events. Thank you for your continued support, and I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 11**

It was late in the artificial night of the castle, when it cropped up.

The four teenage paladins were camping out in the lounge one evening (another one of the things on 'the list'), having reached the stage of quiet but not asleep, (when deep conversations usually came up), and Kieth asked the question.

"Hey, Lance."

The Blue Paladin glanced up at him, indicating for him to carry on.

"You don't have to if you don't want to, but what can you tell us about your parents?"

Lance blinked, the question taking him by surprise, then he tilted his head and responded that his mother died some time ago.

Instantly, Keith was apologetic, "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have brought it up."

The other boy waved his words away, indicating that it was a long time ago, and he'd dealt with it, deciding it was best not to go any further.

By this time, Hunk and Pidge had also stirred out of half-sleep, and the youngest spoke tentatively, "And what about your dad?"

Lance pulled a face, then shrugged.

"You don't know?" Hunk stared at him, "Like, not at all?"

Lance scratched the back of his head, unsure as to how he could explain this. The truth was, there were a great many people who could've been his father, and he didn't think even his mother knew herself who it was. However, he didn't particularly want to explain this.

Pidge saved him the trouble, by cutting into the awkward silence, "Doesn't matter, when we find my dad and brother, you can be a part of our family!"

"Hey!" Hunk instantly responded, "You can't call dibs! I know my parents will love Lance!"

"Shiro's parents would happily take him in." Keith threw out challengingly.

"Well, me and Princess Allura have a castle for him to live in, so top that!"

Somehow, Coran's voice joined the argument, and all of them jumped and found him standing in the doorway.

"Coran! What are you doing here!?"

The man fiddled with his moustache as he answered Pidge's almost shouted question, "I came to check if you lot needed anything, before I went to bed myself." He stepped into the room, "But more importantly, I think Lance should stay here."

"But he'll have a mom, dad, brother and sister if he joins my family." Pidge argued.

"Well, with my family, he'll have a mom, dad, two brothers, an uncle and a niece and nephew." Hunk challenged.

Keith pouted, "Well, Shiro's parents are really cool, and he'll have relatives in Japan."

Coran responded pointedly, "Highly advanced castle that can travel all over the universe, just saying."

"Guys, what's going on?"

Shiro's voice entered the argument, and all eyes fell upon the Black Paladin, who was watching the debate.

Keith immediately appealed to him, "Shiro, don't you think your parents would happily take Lance in when we get back to Earth."

The man merely sighed, then addressed them firmly, "Guys, I think its best to give Lance time to decide for himself where he wants to go." He gave them a look, "Now, we have a full day tomorrow, so you should all get some sleep."

There was silence for a moment, then Pidge spoke incredulously, "Wait, are you actually sending us to bed!?"

Shiro folded his arms sternly, "Yes, now settle down and stop talking."

With a nod, he left them room, Coran following suit, and the teens all stared at each other, Hunk remarking with bewilderment, "Did Shiro just pull a 'dad move' on us?"

Lance shrugged, and Keith nodded, "Yup, I think he did."

Pidge folded her arms grumpily, "Well, I'm not going to listen."

"Guys, I can still hear talking!"

Shiro's stern voice rang out from the other side of the door, and Pidge was the first one to place her head down and shut her eyes. The others chuckled quietly and copied, and soon silence reigned as the Paladins fell into slumber.

* * *

Commander Iverson leafed through the files of Shiro's return to Earth once more.

To say it all went wrong was something of an understatement, two cadets, one former cadet, and an unknown teen breaking their missing pilot out of quarantine and promptly vanishing, just before the appearance of a large blue robot of some kind, certainly counted as a problem.

He dropped the files on the desk and leaned back heavily, what ifs echoing in his mind.

When Shiro landed, his gut had told him something serious was up, they knew full well that 'pilot error' had nothing to do with the Kerberos Mission failing, and Shiro's return only confirmed it.

However, he'd been the good soldier and followed protocol, not taking Shiro's frantic warnings seriously, even though his instincts screamed at him to listen. In the end, their only link to the truth disappeared and the mysterious blue ship appeared, then vanished from their sensors, along with a huge, unidentified vessel.

Naturally, Admiral Sanda was furious, and Iverson was reluctant to point out the fact it might've been avoided if it wasn't for the protocols she'd helped create. In the end, the usual smokescreen lies were used, and the commander wondered (not for the first time) if they were really the best option.

There was a smart knock on his office door, and Iverson swiftly stowed the files out of view before speaking.

"Enter."

A young officer entered, "Commander, the labs wish to discuss something of importance with you sir."

Though slightly confused, Iverson nodded, "Understood, I'll make my way there immediately."

The officer saluted then left the room, message delivered, and the commander frowned briefly before standing and beginning the journey to the labs.

What would the labs want with him, unless they'd found something new about the events of Shiro's return and second disappearance. He quickened his pace and soon came to the labs, striding in with purpose.

No-one was present, except the chief scientist who was waiting for him, and the woman stood, "Commander."

Dr Williams had served the garrison for about the same amount of time as Iverson, the two having a strong, professional relationship, so she dispensed with most formalities and went straight to the point.

"We've found something of note while looking into the events regarding Officer Shirogane's return to Earth." She led him over to a screen and brought up an image of the unknown teen, "Due to his presence at the time, the Garrison has been looking into the identity and background of this boy, to see his connection, if any, to what happened."

Iverson looked at her expectantly, "And?"

She frowned, "We found a little, but that's it." She brought up a file, "About six years ago, he cropped up when he was taken in by a charity that works with street kids. It seems that he was recently orphaned when his mother died and was visiting a soup kitchen for food. Naturally, the authorities were called, and they took him into hospital to be treated for malnourishment. They discovered that he was medically mute, with no possible method of that being changed, unfortunately, he vanished before they could find a suitable home for him. The most they discovered was that his name was Lance."

She brought up another picture, one taken from their own security cameras, "He reappears again here. It seems he's been occasionally sneaking into the base and stealing food, and the occasional piece of equipment, probably to sell." She inclined her head thoughtfully, "Have to hand it to him, he did a good job of avoiding the cameras. We only have this image because it just caught him for a second, before he slipped out of view."

She returned to the original image, "Then, he was found near the crash site. I assume he was on his way here and got swept up unintentionally in what happened. As per protocol, the scientists on site took a blood sample to check for anything unusual, and that's where the issue I want to speak with you about crops up."

She hesitated, and Iverson eyed her, "Well, what's the issue?"

She returned the stare, then spoke carefully, "About seventeen years ago, when you were considerably more hot-blooded than you are now. You ended up falling for the advances of a young woman while under the effect of a lot of celebratory drinks."

He looked away, in shame, "I know when you're talking about, though I remember little of the night in question."

That night in question, he'd been promoted, and had gone out with his comrades to celebrate in the bars. Young as they were, they'd ended up drinking a lot, and when a stranger had offered to spend the night in his company, in his drunken haze, he'd agreed.

Dr Williams was one of the few who about this particular part of his life, the young man he'd left behind a long time ago, hence his patience with her bringing it up now.

Williams sighed, "Well, it seems that part of your life has decided to come back around and haunt you."

She brought up a final page, a report upon the results of test carried out on Lance's blood sample.

"According to this, along with the DNA data we have on you. You are biologically this boy's father."

* * *

 _ **PS-And so, the bombshell drops. To be honest, I'm unsure about this chapter, but we'll see. Please let me know what you thought and I'll hopefully update soon.**_


	12. Chapter 12

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello everyone and welcome to a shorter chapter this time. This one is set during the 'Space Mall' episode, though little of that appears here since its mostly focused on some bonding time between Lance and Allura. Thank you for your continued support and I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 12**

Lance felt horrible.

He was stuffed up, couldn't stop sniffing, was really tired, and just wanted to go to bed. Apparently, he also looked liked death incarnate (according to Hunk), and once 'Space Dad' Shiro had gotten wind of his condition, he was immediately whisked down to the med-bay.

He was now watching Coran reading the results of his scan, while Shiro hovered nearby in concern (as he did whenever any of the Paladins were in the med-bay).

The Altean spun round to face them, a pleased expression on his face.

"Well, there's nothing to worry about. It seems that Lance has simply caught the Bynhidular Flu."

Despite his words, Shiro looked very worried, "The what!?"

"The Bynhildular Flu." Coran repeated, "It's a common virus that simply makes you feel awful for a couple of quintants, but it doesn't do any actual harm and disappears on its own."

"And that applies to humans as well?"

"Of course." The Altean stroked his moustache, "I double checked myself, Lance's body is already fighting off the illness, so we just need to wait for it to blow over."

Shiro glanced at the cryo-pods, "Can't the pods simply do it?"

"Of course not!" Coran looked at him in disappointment, "Not even the pods can do everything. This illness is going to have to go away on its own."

"But Coran!" Shiro protested, "With us needing scaultrite lenses, and Zarkon tracking the Black Lion, we need everyone we can to help."

"There's nothing I can do Shiro, we just have to wait."

With Coran refusing to budge, the Black Paladin sighed, "Fine, but is there anything we can do to help."

The Altean smiled, "Nothing much, as long as Lance rests, it'll all pass by soon enough."

* * *

Now, Lance felt horrible, and was bored.

Shiro had gone to strengthen his bond with the Black Lion, Coran had taken the others to a Swap Moon and Allura was resting after their constant wormhole jumps to escape Zarkon. Meaning he had a lot of his time on his hands and little to do with it, he hadn't realised until now just how much time he spent with the others.

Someone knocked on his door, and he pushed the 'enter' chime, knowing it had to be Allura.

The princess strode in and smiled, "Sorry Lance, but I thought you'd want some company."

He raised an eyebrow, projected symbols asking if she would catch his flu if she hung around him, and she laughed.

"Don't worry, I've had Bynhildular Flu before, and you can only get it once, plus, its not particularly contagious."

He nodded, then pulled a face, and she answered in agreement as she sat down on the side of his bed.

"Yes, its not fun. My mother always went on about how much I complained when I had it."

He frowned, then asked her what her mother had been like, and she looked wistful.

"My mother was kind and loving, though she could be quite severe, even my father would snap to attention when she was displeased." She chuckled, "One time, Coran had done something foolish and broken some ornament she loved, so she proceeded to drag him along by his ear through the castle like a naughty child and made him fix it. No one messed with her when she was angry."

Lance grinned, imagining the scene, and she smiled back.

"Of course, the fact she was a well-trained fighter herself certainly helped. She knew a number of martial arts and could match up to my father, even if he was a great Alchemist." She looked thoughtful, "I suppose it was her strength I admired most, she always stood by her ideals, and didn't let anyone's pre-conceived ideas rule how she acted. That was probably why she was so good at assisting my father with diplomacy, she was honest, and everyone knew it."

Her smile turned sad, "It was that strength that made her join the fight when the Galra attacked Altea, and ultimately lead to her death."

There was silence, and Lance reached out and touched her arm. When she glanced his way, he tilted his head and gave a comforting smile, which she returned.

"Thank you, Lance, and you're right, she did what she had to for her family and people."

He blinked in surprise, wondering how she knew what he'd been thinking of expressing, and she patted his hand.

"You have a wonderful gift Lance, you can say a lot without a single word, telling people exactly what you're thinking with just your actions. My mother could do something very similar, she could calm a screaming child with a simple smile or silence a rude diplomat with a single glare." She ruffled his hair, "I think that's why everyone loves you."

He squirmed in embarrassment, then gave her a mischievous look.

She grinned, "I see, you want to hear more embarrassing stories about Coran?"

He nodded eagerly, and she laughed.

"Okay then, why don't I tell you what happened when my mother discovered he'd traded three quarters of his shipment of lango for a used pogo oscillator."

* * *

Later, Shiro swung by Lance's room to check on him.

Upon being allowed in, he was greeted by the sight of Allura laughing uproariously as she related some funny story involving Coran, her father and something that sounded like the Altean equivalent of ducks.

Lance was grinning like a madman, and he waved to Shiro in greeting.

Shiro smiled, "Seems like you two have been having a fun conversation."

Allura smiled, "I was keeping Lance company, and he wanted to hear some embarrassing stories of Coran."

He sighed, "Man, something tells me that I would've wanted to hear them."

She grinned mischievously, "I'll tell you and the other Paladins them sometime, I'm sure Coran won't mind."

He raised a knowing eyebrow, "I'm sure he won't." He gestured to the door, "The others have just got back, we should probably find out how they got on."

She shrugged, "Then we'll wait for them here, I'm sure they'll come to check on Lance first anyway, and this way, we don't have to repeat what we say at the meeting to him."

He inclined his head, "Fair point."

* * *

As expected, the others did indeed come via Lance's room, and their next plan of action was discussed...once they'd all checked that he was doing okay first.

* * *

 _ **PS-So little is mentioned of Allura's mother in the series, so I took an opportunity to show a little of how I thought she was. Please let me know what you thought and any suggestions for chapters, and I'll hopefully update soon.**_


	13. Chapter 13

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello all and welcome to another chapter. The first half is a scene between Keith and Lance, looking at the aftermath of the switching of the lions. The second is a bit of Iverson's thoughts upon the revelation that was flung at him. Please let me know what you thought, and I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 13**

The hanger of the Black Lion was silent and empty, as if honouring the absence of the Black Paladin.

The only person present was Lance, gazing solemnly up at the head of Voltron, and he sat down heavily upon the floor.

With Shiro gone, and no sign of him to be found anywhere, they'd eventually decided to find a new Paladin for the Black Lion. Each of them had attempted to bond with him, but Keith had been the one to succeed, not that Lance was particularly surprised.

Keith was like Shiro's prodigy, and if he believed the other boy could lead them, then Lance wasn't going to argue the point, what surprised him was the fact that the Red Lion had then called him, summoning him to be his pilot.

While Keith had been an obvious fit for Red, Lance wasn't so sure about himself. Despite Allura explaining that he suited the role as Keith's second, and right arm of Voltron, he wasn't so sure.

He glanced up at the Black Lion once more.

While each of them had a bond with their own lion, receiving knowledge to help pilot and unlock their abilities, they could, occasionally, sense something from the Black Lion as well. It wasn't as clear as their own lions, but they could get a sense of feelings from him, something of the strong, trustworthy presence that Shiro had. Perhaps this was due to him being Voltron's head, and maybe that's one of the reasons the Lion had chosen Shiro.

It was this presence that Lance was looking for.

Shiro had been one of the first people, besides his mother, whom he'd started to trust. The rest of Team Voltron had quickly followed suit, but the Black Paladin had been the catalyst for that trust. He was where Lance went first if something was troubling him, if there was something he didn't understand, but now, he couldn't do that.

He heard someone behind him and spun his head to see Keith standing in the doorway in surprise.

"Lance?"

His face then morphed into understanding, and he sat down beside him. Lance glanced at him, and the other boy sighed.

"It doesn't feel right, taking Shiro's place." He looked down at the floor, "I get that we need a full team, and that Shiro would be the first to say I can do this, but it still feels wrong." He looked back up at the lion, "I mean, I'm not leader material, I'm a loner, I don't work well with other people, and I let my emotions get the better of me all the time." He shook his head, "I'm not the one to do this."

Lance frowned, then clipped the back of Keith's head, causing the other teen to let out a cry and glare at him, "Ow! What was that for?"

The mute boy simply pointed at the lion, then folded his arms firmly, and Keith responded shortly, "Its true Lance, I'm not cut out for this."

Lance huffed, then pointed at the lion once more, prodded his teammate firmly in the chest, then gave him a meaningful look.

"You think, though he chose me, the Black Lion doesn't need me to be ready right now?"

The new Red Paladin nodded, then gestured to the lion and tapped Keith's forehead.

"You're saying he picked me because I have the potential to be as great as Shiro, and he's willing to help teach me how."

Lance smiled and nodded once more, and Keith looked back up at the still lion.

"I guess, I didn't think of it that way." He gave a small smile, "That's exactly how Shiro saw me, makes sense when you think about it." He addressed the lion, "I'll try and make you proud."

As if in answer, the eyes of the Black Lion lit up, and he lowered his head, and even Lance could feel his comforting presence in his mind, almost as if Shiro himself was there.

* * *

Iverson was sat in his office once again, staring at an all too familiar photo.

Lance.

Dr Williams was thorough in her checks, she'd run the tests several times and there was no doubt as to their result. Meaning that he had a previously unknown son, who was now who knows where.

In light of the discovery, he'd used what leverage he had to piece together a more detailed picture of the life Lance had led. He had a fair bit of support, the Garrison were equally eager to understand who Lance was, but his motivations were certainly far more personal.

He supposed it was partly him trying to discover what he truly felt.

He'd never considered having a family, perhaps as some distant, joking fantasy, but he'd accepted himself as a military man through and through. He'd been content with teaching new cadets, now his years of active duty were over, helping them grow and giving the stern pressure they needed to truly flourish. Children of his own had never come into the equation.

And now he had a son.

Though their whereabouts were still unknown, the Garrison was keeping a close watch for anything like the ships they'd detected, and despite the odds, Iverson's instincts told him that they'd all return.

So, he'd tried to discover what he could.

Sadly, it was the story he'd been expecting, of a woman who'd lost everything and ended up being forced into about the only thing she felt she could do. Those responsible were either unknown, or dealt with by the authorities already, but it hadn't been enough for her. Her disappearance suggested that she'd died some time ago, leaving Lance alone to fend for himself.

The worst part was that he hadn't even been able to dig up a name for her, at least, not one among what information they could get. She'd been a complete mystery, likely having left the place of her origin far behind.

He ran a weary hand over his eyes.

So, what would it mean if and when Lance came back, what would happen then? Where would the boy go, and what was he supposed to do about it?

He guessed that the suitable authorities could find somewhere for him, but wasn't it his responsibility to supply that? Could he supply it, would Lance even want him to?

The boy probably had no idea who his father was, would he really accept a man he didn't know and hadn't been there for the entirety of his life? Would he even acknowledge the blood connection between them, want some sort of relationship with a complete stranger?

Did he even want Lance to?

Iverson looked down at the photo once more, the single one taken at the crash sight when the Garrison found him nearby and nodded.

Yes, he did want Lance to acknowledge him, give him a chance to be something of a father. Perhaps it was paternal instinct at work, he barely knew the teen after all, but he wanted to be a part of the boy's life, the way he hadn't been for seventeen years.

However, if Lance wanted nothing to do with him, he'd accept that to, and hope for it to change one day, though something told him that the rejection would hurt more than he could guess right now.

He closed his one good eye.

For now, all he could do was wait and hope, for the chance to see his son once more.

* * *

 _ **PS-And there we go. Please let me know what you thought, and I'll hopefully update soon.**_


	14. Chapter 14

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello all and welcome to this long overdue chapter. Since this series jumps about the timeline, I've skipped on ahead to the Paladin's early days back on Earth. As you'd expect, this looks at some very important things that have to be sorted between Lance and Iverson. I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 14**

Earth, but it wasn't in the state they'd been expecting.

Effectively conquered by Sendak, their home planet's freedom had been reduced to a single Garrison base, and a measly amount of scattered people who'd evaded death or capture.

They'd been forced to leave the lions behind, and sneak down to the planet in a stolen Galra fighter, managing to meet up with Garrison fighters and reaching Earth's last stronghold.

Lance glanced around, finally finding himself with time on his hands.

After their arrival, they'd been rushing from one thing to the next, going from fighting Galra to sitting through a debriefing as they got up to speed on what had happened in their (far longer than planned) absence. That had left little time to themselves, but now, Lance finally had just that.

So, he wandered the base.

They had been given clearance to go pretty much anywhere, despite Admiral Sanda seemingly not trusting them, so he'd wandered, wanting to know the layout of their new base.

Eyes followed him as he walked, people whispering, apparently not realising he could hear them, but he kept going. They'd expected as much, Sam Holt had effectively told them everything about the Paladins of Voltron after all, so they were definitely going to attract attention.

The whispers continued.

"Hey, is that one of the Paladins?"

"Definitely, that has to be the blue one."

"But I thought that alien princess was the blue one?"

"He's wearing the blue armour."

"Yeah, but I heard that he'd moved to the Red Lion because Kogane ended up piloting the Black."

"So why the blue armour?"

Lance rolled his eyes, since Allura had her own armour, they'd kept their original sets for their own ease, unfortunately, it seemed to be confusing everyone else.

"Isn't he the dumb one?"

That comment caught his attention.

"He's mute, not dumb, but yes, I think that's him."

"So, he's the homeless kid that got caught up in it all, are we really putting our hope in someone who hasn't been trained."

Lance scowled, the stuck-up twit, did he really think they were in a position to be picky? Half the people on the base weren't trained, but they were still pulling through. Besides, he'd been taught by Shiro, not to mention Keith, Allura and even Coran, add his combat experience and he was probably a better pilot than most here, except maybe the MFE pilots, he'd only seen footage, but they had skill.

"Get back to work!"

Iverson's voice barked at the gossipers, and they swiftly dispersed, fearful of the commander's displeasure.

Once they'd gone, the man sighed, "I'm sorry about that, you'd have thought this war would've given them more sense."

Lance simply shrugged, while their comments had been annoying, he was willing to let them slide, he was long used to proving himself through his actions and they couldn't afford to create bad blood between each other.

Iverson stared at him in silence, as if wrestling with something, and just as he opened his mouth to speak, a messenger ran up.

"Commander Iverson, Paladin Lance, they want you both at another strategy meeting."

Iverson frowned but answered, "Understood."

* * *

The meeting had quickly deteriorated.

It had been initially called to discuss how best to implement the Paladins and begin planning a way to defeat Sendak. Unfortunately, Sanda had once again pressed her idea of surrendering the lions, leading to the, currently calm, but icy argument between her and Princess Allura.

Personally, Iverson didn't understand why she so believed it would work, from everything he'd seen of Sendak's invasion, and all he'd heard from Sam, and now Shiro and the others, he was certain handing over the lions was the last thing they should do. Sendak wouldn't just say thanks and go home, he had control of most of the planet and the lions were their best chance at changing that, why leave a subjugated planet that had surrendered its greatest weapon? It was obvious that he'd simply continue his conquest once he had Voltron.

But she just couldn't see it.

Perhaps it was desperation, causing her to not think things through fully, desperation caused by the knowledge at just how outgunned they were.

"Handing over the lions is not an option, and it never will be!"

Princess Allura was now on her feet, leaning over the table as she stared Admiral Sanda down.

For her part, the admiral stared back unflinchingly, "And once again, I ask why an alien should assert her authority on Earth's affairs."

Shiro attempted to calm the situation, "Admiral, I understand your thinking, but Sendak will not leave Earth when he has the lions, he wholeheartedly follows the Galra Empire's desire for conquest. As far as he's concerned, the only other option is his own death."

"The lions are our only bargaining chip." Sanda reiterated, "We have nothing else left with which to fight Sendak."

"Admiral." Iverson entered the argument, hoping to help her see reason, "I agree with Shirogane and the Princess, we can't surrender the lions."

"Commander."

The admiral's voice held a note of warning, but he wasn't backing down now, "They have more experience fighting the Galra than we, plus, they have faced Sendak personally. I believe them when they say that he will not abide to any agreement to leave Earth alone."

A chime sounded from further down the table, and all eyes turned to Lance, who'd used his headset to make the sound. Now he had their attention, he quickly displayed symbols to express his opinion and Keith nodded firmly, "Lance is right, Sendak's character aside, why would any general with this much of an advantage abandon a planet he'd effectively conquered. He holds all the cards and all we've got is the fact he doesn't know Voltron is here yet."

Lance projected more symbols and this time Sam spoke, "Agreed, while the MFEs are effective, they don't have enough power on their own to win this war nor make much impact on Sendak's forces, and since the Atlas cannot fly, Voltron is our only method of fighting back."

Lance projected a few more and Iverson nodded, "We need the lions Admiral, we don't have the resources to make more MFEs and Sendak will not surrender, we cannot give him Voltron."

Sanda glared, "Commander, I fear you are letting your personal feelings influence you, Lance may be your son but that doesn't mean you must agree with everything he says."

Many of those present gasped, and a deathly hush fell.

For his part, Iverson briefly shut his eye, even as he felt everyone else's fall upon him, and then stared pointedly at Sanda, who quickly glanced around, realising what she'd inadvertently done.

"WHAT!"

Pidge's shriek echoed through the room, startling everyone as she shot to her feet and pointed at Iverson, "You're Lance's dad!"

Her exclamation caused an uproar, as the majority of the Paladins demanded an explanation, even as Shiro attempted to calm them down. Coran was giving the Commander the dirtiest glare possible from his position behind the princess while the other Garrison officers, who'd been in the know, shifted awkwardly.

Despite all this, Iverson focused his eyes on Lance, completely blank on what to say or do, on how to handle the boy finding out in this way.

The Red Paladin, remained motionless, shocked, until he suddenly stood, and shot out of the room, his exit bringing everything to silence.

Iverson watched the door shut behind him.

* * *

Thanks to the sudden revelation, the meeting had all but collapsed.

Knowing that continuing was pointless, a halt had been called, and the Garrison officers had quickly vacated the room, Admiral Sanda seemed initially inclined to stay, but had read the mood and also left.

Only the Paladins, Coran, and Iverson remained, and Shiro sat uneasily between his team, and the Commander.

Team Voltron were all giving Iverson looks of various degrees of anger (with Coran's being most deadly, closely followed by Keith's), but the Commander's gaze was fixed upon the door Lance had left through, as it had been since the boy had fled. Shiro knew that there was more to this story than everyone was assuming, so he took the initiative and spoke.

"Commander Iverson."

As if shocked, Iverson jerked and glanced at him, and Shiro spoke gently, "What Sanda said about you and Lance, is it true?"

Iverson shut his one eye, and gave a sad sigh, "Yes."

"Then why the hell have you been letting him live on the streets!" Keith practically shouted.

"Keith!"

Shiro shot him a stern look, silencing him, then faced Iverson once more, his voice gentler, "Iverson?"

The commander opened his eye, "Because I didn't know he existed until the day you returned to Earth the first time Shiro."

He stared at the table as he continued, "Lance's mother was forced into an absolute low, and she started doing about the only thing she thought she could to survive." Here, he gave them a meaningful look, "I don't think I need to spell out what I mean by that." He looked down once more, "Years ago, when I was far younger, I was celebrating a promotion, had too much to drink, and I'm sure you can guess what happened."

Shiro closed his own eyes and nodded, "I see." He glanced up, "I'm guessing you found out after the Blue Lion left Earth."

Iverson nodded, "Lance was near your crash site, so, as per protocol, we took him in and took a blood sample to test for anything of note or potentially dangerous. Of course, he escaped with you all and left in the Blue Lion. During tests of his blood, Dr Williams noticed something about his DNA, since there's DNA records of all Garrison personnel, all she had to do was test it against mine and discovered the biological connection."

"So, why haven't you told him yet?"

It was Hunk who'd spoken, his look of anger having turned to one of compassion, and Iverson shook his head.

"With the invasion, there was no good time when you'd first arrived to tell him, not without everyone bearing witness, and after that…" He sighed, "I didn't know how to start, I'd just worked up the courage to ask to speak to him about it, but then this meeting was called."

Shiro glanced at the rest of the team, Hunk and Pidge seemed to have mellowed, as had Allura. Keith's expression was unreadable, but Coran still looked disapproving.

Suddenly, Hunk stood.

"I'm going to find Lance."

"No."

Everyone stared at Keith, clearly confused by his answer, but Shiro had an idea as to his thinking.

"But, why not?"

At Hunk's question, the Black Paladin simply looked at Iverson.

"You should go and find him."

With a grateful nod, Iverson swiftly stood and left, the moment the door closed behind him, Pidge rounded on Keith.

"What are you doing Keith, surely Iverson is the last person who should be speaking to Lance right now?"

Keith shook his head, "No, this is something they need to sort out between themselves sooner rather than later."

His eyes grew distant.

"It's a conversation that's years overdue already."

* * *

Lance hid, tucked away in a corner of one of the hangers, his headset abandoned at his feet.

The moment he'd left the briefing room, he'd searched for somewhere to hide and think, normally he'd retreat to Red, but he was well out of reach on one of Saturn's moons, so he'd found this hidden corner instead.

Iverson was his father.

He'd long since stopped wondering about who his father was, considering it impossible to ever know, and was content with never finding out, assuming it would be someone he wouldn't want to be with anyway.

But now he knew.

How had they worked it out? What could they have possibly done to discover it? Memories of Pidge's lessons on DNA came to mind, and he remembered that they'd taken some of his blood, right back when Shiro had crash landed. That must be how they realised. But how long had Iverson known?

Why hadn't said anything before now?

Lance shook his head, when could he have said anything. Everything since their arrival had been a blur of combat, introductions, briefings and meetings, there hadn't been time for anything else other than talking about the war, and it wasn't exactly a topic that could be easily broached.

He leaned back heavily against the wall.

Now what? He barely knew the man, only knowing him through stories told by the others and the various meetings they'd been at. He'd hardly spent any personal time with Iverson.

But he was his father, surely, they could make time?

He shut his eyes.

He wanted it, so badly. There was an ache inside him, one he'd ignored and pushed down for so long he'd forgotten about it, but looking back, it had always been there. It had been alleviated slightly by Shiro and Coran, but now it returned in full force, demanding his attention.

A desire for a father.

"Lance."

His eyes shot open, and he looked up at the man standing near him, clearly nervous and afraid.

Iverson…his father.

"Can I sit with you?"

The question was tentative, a far cry from the commander's usual confidence, and Lance considered, then slowly nodded.

Carefully, Iverson lowered himself to the ground beside him, and also leaned back against the wall. They sat in silence, a tense, awkward silence, neither one sure on how to begin.

Eventually, Iverson spoke, "So, I guess I should explain…"

Lance tapped his arm and shook his head, cutting the man off. He then tapped the side of his own head, and Iverson nodded.

"I see, you're already sure as to how it happened."

The boy nodded, then pointed between them and then forward.

The Commander smiled in understanding, "I understand, let's focus on the future."

Lance smiled back in response.

There was no point dwelling on the past, it wasn't like anything was any one person's fault, stuff happened, and it brought them along their separate paths, it didn't really matter at this point.

They sat in silence once more, both shifting awkwardly and wanting to ask the same thing, but having difficulty working up the courage to do so.

Lance lifted his hands, then dropped them, trying to work out how to communicate what he wanted to say, he glanced at Iverson, then back at the floor, still unsure as to what to do.

He knew what he wanted to ask, he knew the feelings he wanted to express, but without words, he had no idea on how to do it. For one of the few times in his life, he really hated his inability to speak.

He wanted Iverson to be his father, properly.

But how to ask?

Movement beside him caught his attention, and he saw Iverson, holding out an open hand, as if to shake it. He looked up at the man's face and saw hope in his eyes.

"Lance, I want to try and be a father to you, but only if that's what you want. If not, can we at least shake hands as friends."

Lance looked down at the offered hand, then smiled as a way to express himself came to mind.

He took Iverson's hand, but instead of shaking it, he moved it up to his head, and used it to ruffle his hair. He then released it with a smile and moved to his knees, opening his arms. Iverson stared a moment, then obliged, pulling Lance into his arms and gently stroking his hair.

Lance grinned as his dad hugged him.

* * *

 _ **PS-There we go, and I hope the whole thing worked well. The next chapter or two might focus on Lance/Iverson father/son stuff, but Paladin fluff will return. Please let me know what you thought, and I'll hopefully update soon.**_


	15. Chapter 15

_**Author's Notes:**_

 _ **Hello and sorry for the very long gap between updates, my writing imagination just hasn't been present for months. This is more interaction between Iverson and Lance, albeit some very short interaction. I apologise once again, and I hope you enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 15**

After the (unintended) revelation, Lance and Iverson began to sort out their new dynamic as father and son.

Of course, it was hardly easy to do, since there was a war going on and both of them had duties to attend to, but they made time where they could. Of course, it wasn't long before word got around, since they'd decided that keeping it secret was pretty pointless considering the number of people present when Sanda dropped the bombshell.

Unsurprisingly, the news had little impact on the base as a whole, there were far more important things to spend time over than unexpected family connections. If anything, people were happy for them, since separated families were all too common with the ongoing war.

With regards to their duties, they tried to not to let it interfere with what had to be done. Yes, Iverson would be lying if he said he wasn't worried when Lance had to go out on a mission, but as an officer, he knew that Lance needed to be out there for everyone else's sake. Though he did keep a closer eye on his son's comm channel than he really needed to.

The most interesting of changes was his sudden assimilation into Team Voltron.

He suspected that Lance had convinced the others to not hold the situation against his father, and most had treated him warmly. True, Coran had hinted as to his dire fate should he cause the boy harm, but with that understanding, the older Altean was not hostile. This led to him becoming something of a neutral ground between Voltron and the Admiralty, allowing them to overcome their initial problems and actually start working together. Sanda was still unhappy, but she had accepted their arguments begrudgingly, which was probably the best they were going to get.

So, with a degree of unity, the fight against Sendak continued.

* * *

Iverson yawned and rubbed his tired eyes.

Even in war, the Garrison still somehow managed to produce endless amounts of paperwork. True, it was actually all digital, but that didn't make it much better.

As a senior officer, he used to be entitled to a full suite that included a private office, bedroom and en-suite. However, he'd handed that over to make room for civilians that came seeking shelter and converted a part of his old public office into a sort of sleeping area, that had recently acquired a second single bed.

The door swished open, announcing the arrival of Lance, returning from some intensive training.

The boy took one look at his father's computer and grimaced, knowing full well what was on it. In response, Iverson looked him over, instantly seeing all the signs of a tough session.

"Has Keith been driving you all hard again?"

Lance rolled his eyes, confirming the assumption, and the man chuckled.

"Good."

At that, the boy gave a glare, and his headset quickly produced a series of symbols.

Iverson smiled, "Well of course I'm like Shiro, who do you think was the one running him into the ground when was a cadet." He looked thoughtful, "Though he always did push himself hard without any encouragement."

Lance had started to pull off his armour, and his father raised an eyebrow, "Aren't you going to get a shower?"

One of their great advantages was the fact that the base had its own, protected water supply. It had been one of the first things secured after the invasion, thus leaving them with one of their most basic needs.

Lance rolled his eyes once more, and then quickly did a mime for Allura.

"I see, the princess and Pidge beat you to it." Iverson turned back to the computer, "Well, you were smart to not fight with them over it."

They remained in comfortable silence, as Lance continued to remove his armour and Iverson returned to his work.

Time passed and he kept working until he noticed the odd silence.

Despite not knowing Lance long, Iverson had discovered that there were differences in Lance's silences, differences that he noticed. Whether it was parental instinct or something else, he didn't know, but he could always tell without looking when Lance was awake or at rest if they were both in the same room, and he was certain that the boy had fallen asleep.

Turning around, he found his hunch was indeed correct, there was his son, curled up on his bed, apparently having drifted off after shedding his armour.

In a way that was likely a left over from his days on the streets, Lance always slept curled up like a cat, his bedding often abandoned on the floor somewhere.

Iverson frowned thoughtfully, it was actually more akin to the way a lion would curl at rest, Lance's head on his hands and legs tucked beneath him.

The man smiled.

Coran had once referred to the Paladins as little lions, out of earshot of everyone else, and Iverson couldn't deny the similarities they bore to their respective lions.

Gently, he got up and carefully placed the discarded blanket over his son, letting the young lion sleep.

His computer gave a soft chime, and Iverson frowned. Upon investigation, he saw a message from Admiral Sanda, requesting a meeting with him in her office immediately.

Suppressing a sigh, he left the room and strode out to his superior's office.

* * *

He was allowed entrance promptly, and the Admiral was already sat waiting for him behind his own desk.

Like his own, her office doubled as a bedroom due to the number of civilians needing shelter, so it was now far less tidy than it once had been. However, she had a definite workspace with room for meetings with her senior officers.

She nodded curtly, "Take a seat Commander."

He did as commanded, and awaited her next words, she didn't leave him waiting.

"Commander Iverson, do you truly believe that continuing this fight is what's best?"

Straight to the point as always, Sanda immediately went for the main question, and Iverson give an equally to the point answer.

"I do Admiral."

No doubt she'd expected his answer, he wasn't known for backing down easily when he'd made a decision, one of the reasons she trusted his input.

Sanda didn't waver, "And why is that?"

"Because I believe it is our only option, if we want to have a chance at surviving." He laid his thoughts before her, "As we know, the Galra have us outnumbered, outgunned, and effectively trapped within this base. They control almost the entirety of Earth and have no other form of resistance other than us. This is an advantage no general would surrender, not even for something like Voltron. I doubt they will parley, and I'm certain they will simply crush us if the lions are handed over to them, in fact, they could well be counting on it."

She stared at him steadily, "And that is your only reasons for believing in this course of action?"

He returned the stare, "What are you implying Admiral?"

She leaned on her desk, "I am concerned that your personal connection to the Red Paladin may be clouding your judgement."

He replied steadily, "Admiral, bear in mind that continuing to fight places him directly on the front lines, I do not side with that course lightly." He looked down briefly, "But Lance is ready to take that risk, and as a commander of this base I must be as well, even if I dread sending him out to fight, knowing he might not return."

There was silence for several long moments, then she finally spoke again, "And if we should end up at odds with the Paladins, what will you do then?"

He did not reply immediately, but when he did, he met her eyes directly, "We all wish to take back our home and see an end to this war Admiral, there should be no cause for us to end up at such odds with the Paladins."

They held gazes, staring each other down for nearly a whole minute, until Admiral Sanda gave a single nod, "You are dismissed Commander."

Iverson stood and started to walk out the room, but he stopped in the door, and spoke without turning around.

"Lance will always be my first choice Admiral, I know that for certain."

* * *

 _ **PS-So a bit of a tense conversation between Sanda and Iverson there at the end. Please let me know what you thought and I'll hopefully update far sooner than last time.**_


	16. Chapter 16

_**Author's Note:**_

 _ **Hello and welcome to another chapter. This one has actually sat nearly completed for months, and I've only just scraped enough motivation to finish it, so apologies for the long wait. This one is all about the aftermath of the big battle to liberate Earth. I hope you all enjoy the chapter.**_

 _ **I own nothing.**_

* * *

 **Chapter 16**

Iverson gripped the door of the vehicle, staring at the rapidly approaching form of the Red Lion.

It had been a whirlwind of an intense few hours, filled with endless combat, constant stacking of the odds against them, and adrenaline fuelled near misses.

Some far more personal to him than others.

When Lance's line went dead at the start of the fight, his blood had run cold, warmed only by the relief at hearing his son's voice finally confirming the arrival of his lion. It ran cold again when the lions were captured, only years of military training converting his panic into focused work. From then on, it was the world's worst rollercoaster of highs and lows as they overcame one foe, only to have another one appear to do battle.

But nothing compared to the helplessness of watching the Red Lion, his son inside, tumbling from space to crash in the desert.

The moment the Atlas regained functionality, Shiro had her land properly and sent vehicles out to the crash sites without delay, fully stocked with available medical supplies. It went without saying that Iverson was on the one headed for the Red Lion.

The lion lay in the crater it had caused, unmoving and silent, smoke and dust still swirling around it and the vehicle pulled right alongside. As if waiting for them, the Lion got its head upright, and opened its mouth, allowing Iverson to rush inside to the cockpit.

Inside he found his son as still and unmoving as the Lion, and he wasted no time looking for a pulse, there was a terrifying moment when he couldn't find it, but then, there it was, weak but steady.

The med-team had followed him in, and he moved aside as they got to work.

* * *

It took days, days that were even harder than the few hours of intense fighting.

It was mostly waiting, waiting for the medics to finish, then waiting at Lance's bedside. There were times he had to be elsewhere, he was still a commander and battle clear-up had to be done, but all his spare moments were spent with his son. Thankfully, through the skilful work of their medics, all the Paladins were going to make a full recovery, but there was always doubt, doubt that wouldn't disappear until Lance was awake.

So, Iverson waited, basically living in his son's room so that he was always there, and he wasn't the only one.

All the Paladins had friends and family waiting with them, the Holts remained with Katie, Kolivan and Krolia (who'd arrived with many others after the battle) stayed with Keith, Hunk had his recently liberated family with him and Coran and Romelle remained with Allura. Shiro, when not leading the survivors in clean-up and making a start on rebuilding their home, moved between all of them, spending most time with Keith and Lance, and Coran also moved between them all. Even the MFE pilots visited when they could, seeming to have some respect for the Paladins.

He continued to wait.

* * *

It was night outside, and Iverson was seated, as always, beside Lance's bed.

They'd finally managed to move the Lions from their crash sites, though the Lions themselves had done most of the work. Coran hoped that the fact they were moving meant that the Paladins would soon be waking up as well, the Lions repairing as their pilots healed. They'd moved them to behind the memorial that Shiro had set up on the ruins of the Garrison base, and Shiro himself was planning to address everyone tomorrow in a service of remembrance. He'd informed them that they didn't have to leave the Paladins to attend, and Iverson eagerly took the option to stay.

The door opened, but the commander didn't look up, knowing it was Coran doing his evening rounds of the Paladins.

The Altean entered in silence, and stood beside him, looking down at the sleeping Lance.

"Any change?"

Iverson sighed, "No, not yet, but the doctors are certain he'll wake up soon."

"That's good."

They lapsed into silence once more, remaining that way as Lance breathed softly, then Coran spoke quietly, "He was really happy to discover that you were his father you know."

The commander raised an eyebrow, "He was?"

The Altean nodded, "Yes, once he got over the shock, he was happy and excited." He smiled, "He'd started to understand what a family was supposed to be, so I believe he had started yearning for a father in his life." Coran chuckled, "I must confess, I'm a little jealous of you."

Iverson frowned at the man's admission, and he wondered if Coran had once actually had children.

"Were you a father once?"

Coran shook his head, "No, I was always dedicated to the Royal Family, I suppose being a surrogate uncle to the Princess was enough for me, but then Lance turned up and I guess I saw myself as something of a father figure to him."

Iverson smiled, "Well, you can still be an uncle."

Coran looked at him in surprise, and the commander shrugged, "Let's face it, he's already built himself a crazy family, a surrogate uncle is hardly going to shake things up."

At that, they both chuckled and as they finished, Coran spoke, "Well, you're certainly proving to be a good father, so I'll take being an uncle."

Iverson nodded, "Thank you."

They fell into a comfortable silence.

* * *

Shiro's address was playing quietly in the background when Lance finally stirred.

It took a moment of the boy blinking before he sat up in bed, focused on the tv at the foot of the bed, taking in the end of Shiro's speech. He looked sideways and smiled upon seeing his father, a smile Iverson returned.

"Welcome back."

His son gestured tiredly, and the commander nodded, "Yes, you've been out for some time, but the doctors say you and the others will all make a full recovery."

Lance nodded, relief clear on his face, and Iverson waited only a moment, before pulling the boy into a gentle hug, holding the embrace and speaking quietly, "You don't know, how glad I am to see you awake and well."

His son's grip tightened briefly in acknowledgement.

* * *

Shiro clearly had left right after his address since he arrived in Lance's room not long after the broadcast finished.

Iverson was in the middle of telling Lance what had happened during his recovery, and the former paladin smiled upon seeing the interaction between the two, "Glad to see someone's feeling better."

At his words, Lance looked round and grinned at Shiro, before gesturing something that made the man raise an eyebrow, "Yes, I did pre-write my speech."

Iverson gasped in mock horror, "You mean you didn't produce it on the spot? Shiro, you're losing your touch, I thought you had the impromptu, noble leader speeches nailed."

The younger man gave him mock glare, "Hey, I thought it would be better if I put some effort into this one, rather then making it up as I went alone. It was nice to pre-prepare something rather than flying by the seat of my pants for once."

"For what its worth, you do a good job in pant seat flying."

"Thank you, Commander Iverson." Shiro responded sarcastically, "Your skills of encouragement are as cultured as ever."

Throughout this whole exchange, Lance had been smirking and shaking with silent laughter, and Shiro turned his attention back to him, "By the way, Coran has been telling me, very enthusiastically, that he's claimed position of surrogate uncle."

Lance casually shrugged and nodded, causing Shiro to fold his arms.

"So, what am I, chopped liver? I thought I'd get the uncle position?"

Iverson raised an eyebrow himself, "There can be more than one uncle you know."

Lance glanced at him, then back to Shiro before gesturing something.

"Wait, I've been demoted from 'Space Dad'!?"

The former paladin looked aghast, and Iverson burst out laughing as Lance nodded firmly, the boy then proceeded to gesture some more, and Shiro blinked.

"So, I've been demoted from 'Space Dad' to 'big brother'?"

Lance nodded, and Shiro went to say something, then stopped and looked thoughtful for a moment, before finally answering.

"Fair enough, I think I actually prefer that, I'm too young to be considered a dad."

Iverson glared, "And what's that supposed to mean?"

Shiro gulped, "Anyway, I should go and check on the others, if you're awake, then they likely are as well."

The captain of the Atlas beat a hasty retreat out the door.

* * *

 _ **PS-So Shiro has now been demoted to 'big brother', and Coran is confirmed as a surrogate uncle. Please let me know what you thought and I'll hopefully update soon.**_


End file.
